Health Minister Andrew Little was visibly upset that NZNO members rejected the latest DHB offer and that we plan to go ahead with an eight-hour nationwide strike tomorrow.
We get that. Nobody wants a strike, and he genuinely thought it was a generous offer.
He was quick to point out the various base rate increases and down payments on pay equity nurses would receive. But what Mr Little didn’t seem to get was that for DHB nurses, midwives, healthcare assistants and kaimahi hauora, negotiations are much more about safe staffing than they are about money.
Our members have asked for a 17% increase because that’s what’s needed to recognise their real value and bring them into line with their counterparts in similar male-dominated professions.
The latest DHB offer was not 17%, but what really upset our members was a lack of DHB willingness to guarantee nurses would be safe at work and for DHBs to be accountable when they are not. Instead, we got the same old vague promises to look into the safe staffing issue so it can be sorted in the future.
Our members are sick of this. Safe staffing should be a given, not something we have to negotiate but here we are again because nothing changes.
We were told pay equity would be sorted by 2020; we’re still waiting.
Under an accord we had with the ministry all DHBs were to have the safe staffing tool CCDM in place by June this year. Only half have managed this. Under the same accord, all nurse graduates were supposed to be guaranteed a job to help address shortages. That hasn’t happened.
Most importantly, none of the recommendations from the 2005 Safe Staffing/Healthy Workplaces Committee of Inquiry have been fully implemented. If they had, we probably wouldn’t be facing this situation today.
After decades of DHBs refusing to be accountable, the end of the road has been reached. Despite repeated calls for safer staffing because nurses and their patients are at risk; despite it being clear that nurses are burned out and overwhelmed at work every day; and despite nurses leaving in unprecedented numbers, the DHB/Government response is once again, “Trust us, we’ll hold an inquiry”.
Obviously, nurses don’t trust DHB promises because they’re not staying. At present there are 1450 nurse vacancies (that we know of). That’s up from 1200 in March and the numbers are only going to keep climbing because no-one wants to be a nurse anymore.
That’s a problem. It means we and our loved ones are unlikely to get good nursing care when we need it. It’s frightening that basic cares are missed and that chronic conditions seriously worsen during long wait times. But it’s absolutely demoralising for nurses, who just want to provide decent care but end up praying every day that no-one dies on their shift.
So what will make nurses accept the next offer?
First pay must be addressed. Our members have not backed down from 17%. That is what is fair after decades of devaluation, and that is what is needed to ensure we have enough nurses.
We accept that an advance on pay equity may have to be part of addressing the shortfall, but we need solid figures because right now nobody knows what the result of pay equity talks will be.
It’s not fair on that basis to dangle pay equity as a future solution.
Most importantly, we need DHBs to tangibly accept responsibility for safe staffing so things will really change. We want to see acknowledgement when wards are understaffed and recognition for nurses working understaffed shifts.
We want enforceability clauses so DHBs have to front up when wards are unsafely staffed, and we want to see them taking the initiative in this.
Without these measures nurses will keep being expected to turn up each day to work under traumatic conditions, and they’ll keep being ignored when they complain or advocate for better patient care.
We’re just not going to put up with that anymore.
Please support our nurses tomorrow because this strike is important for us all.
- Glenda Alexander is industrial services manager for the New Zealand Nurses Organisation.
