Knock-on effect of Nurses pay claim

KCRMoney said:
We have one of the highest ratios of nurses per capita in the world.

Ireland 12.398
Australia 10.102
UK 8.869.

Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.MED.NUMW.P3?end=2016&start=2004

We also have a relatively young population. Average age:

Ireland 36.9
Australia 38.6
UK 40.7

Source: http://world.bymap.org/MedianAge.html

Issue isn't staffing levels. Its staff organiastion and utilisation by management. Looks like a money grab to me.
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If nurses were striking over system management etc, I'd fully back them, not that they need my support, it's the default position of most Irish people to unconditionally back nurses.
 
Delboy said:
Like everywhere else in the PS/CS, you'll find that outdated and restrictive work practices kept in place by vested interests are the main issues to having a 21st century health service. Throwing more wages at the problem will not solve it one bit.
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Nor is it meant to
 
Early Riser said:
I would suggest it is more widespread than that again. The opposition to Health Service reform is pervasive and pernicious (while all pay lip service to it).

The health service unions are obstructive (each for their own). Local communities oppose any "loss" locally, no matter how ineffective, inefficient or inappropriate the service might be. This is not just because of local access to service (although always couched that way) but because they or a family member works in it - or local business fear loss of trade if employment is moved elsewhere. Polticians respond to their local electorate ( " I fully support reform but.........). Everybody wants Health Service reform - somewhere else by someone else (unless there is a promotion, etc) dangled in front of me.




I wasn't able to access the graphic. But I sometimes wonder how accurate these global comparators are? Did you see this critique article in the Irisy Times ?

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/...and-mask-real-shortage-in-hospitals-1.3775004
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Ireland is very small so reform always means someone you know looses their job or conditions, add in the electoral system which requires taking the middle ground on everything and you have endless fudge.

I went to roscommon hospital last June for an xray, it's nearly an hour away but going to Galway would mean sitting waiting for ten hours, ballinasloe about six

I was in and out of roscommon in two hours and forty five minutes of that involved waiting for the radiographer to come in from athlone where they lived, the hospital was empty so they didn't have a radiographer permanently on duty, try and close the place down and every local politician would be on radio within an hour so as to put voters straight as to where they stood.

There will never be a proper functioning public health service as we don't want one
 
KCRMoney said:
Why the looking for more money then, they should be asking for reform not money.
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Yep, it the INMO were striking to get reforms implemented which would save money and/or deliver better services I'd be out there supporting them.
 
I have backed Nurses/Midwives on several threads on this forum. I was working with the HSE when the Lansdowne and Haddington Road Agreements were agreed. As an unpaid union official I spoke against both agreements on several fronts. INMO were instrumental in having the agreements introduced. The Public/Civil Service were shortchanged in both agreements.

The Bottom Line:- Lansdowne and Haddington Road Agreements were agreed upon (despite me). There is a time and place for everything; this is not the time and the Health Service is not the place. The nurses are doing themselves no favours in the current situation. They are breaking a Pay Agreement that they bought into.

Worse again, I am listening to hypocritical greed mongers informing listeners on national radio that the Nurses are on strike to support the patients. Gut wrenching at best. The nurses are on a solo run at this time and don't care a whit about anybody else including other workers, patients etc.
 
There was a nurse on Liveline earlier who said to a man on the other line, who had an operation cancelled because of the strike, that "We are doing this for you, the patients"!
 
Delboy said:
There was a nurse on Liveline earlier who said to a man on the other line, who had an operation cancelled because of the strike, that "We are doing this for you, the patients"!
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In the words of Clint Eastwood

" don't p1ss down my neck and call it rain
 
For the ordinary Joe Public out there and most seem to be behind the nurses, can anyone put up what the nurses pay actually is? Today I spoke with a nurse who told me she works a 3 day shift and that's her week. That comes across as, nice work if you can get it. She was very happy with this arrangement and no way she wants it changed. Also said to me that this situation is available to mostly middle aged nurses and the younger one's just do as they're told. Now, i'm one of those behind the nurses but surely the facts of everything should be out there.
 
1. Let's keep with the full truth. A 3 day shift for a nurse is usually a 12 hour day. Therefore, 36 hours is this nurse's weekly work time.
2. When I started working (1960's) nurses worked a 39 hour week (or at least were paid 78 hours over the fortnight; the additional time worked was always given back to them). I don't know numbers or percentages, but I believe only a minority of nurses are currently working fulltime. OK nurses on night duty working full hours do 12 hours nightly over 7 days (84 hours on which 6 hours are returned to them either in overtime or time off).
3. I can say what nurses pay actually is. I know the overtime rates, the night duty allowance, Sunday Rates, etc. They are no secret, a simple trek on the internet will show these rates.
4. Nurses do courses and they pay for them themselves. If they did the same courses in the UK, the NHS would pay for the courses.
5. For once, I agree with Delboy (above) the nurse on Liveline pissed me off too. The first casualty of any strike is the truth. This is no exception.
 
That link just gives averages and puts in pensions, etc, which is not giving the proper nurses wage.
I've gone into the HSE site and found salaries, etc, from Oct 2018 but to tell the truth it's practically impossible to make head nor tail from it. So many grades and then different salaries within the grades, it's almost impossible to tell what a nurse is nowday's. Anyway, I did give it a good read and tried my best to understand it and, what I take from it is the new recruits aren't too well paid but they've been given a great start in life, so all in all on nurses pay I'd have to agree that they're not badly paid. Maybe staffing is a problem but there's a mafiosa at play in the hospitals and i've no doubt about that.
What does our goverment do now? I think it's time for the truth to come out.
Why are there so many agency nurses at an enormous cost? Are nurses ran off their feet? Not as far as I can see and have seen.
Have all nurses got the 4 year honours degree from a university? I doubt it very much.
Is working a 3 day shift a perk? One has to say a big YES.
Will the nurses lose the public's backing if the whole truth was known? I'd have to say again a Big Yes.
Can the goverment make things easier? Of course they can but the ward nurse managers need to pull out the finger as well. Nurses are saying the public need to have the facts known? Know what? They might be sorry when those facts emerge but, will they emerge? That's only for starters.
 
The general population is hugely supportive of nurses and always have been, to the point where salaries are meaningless, the received wisdom is that they are poorly paid and the media do little to disuade this narative, the government knows this, were there not such concern over the brexit aftermath, I've no doubt that the government would have rolled over by now
 
T
Leper said:
1. Let's keep with the full truth. A 3 day shift for a nurse is usually a 12 hour day. Therefore, 36 hours is this nurse's weekly work time.
2. When I started working (1960's) nurses worked a 39 hour week (or at least were paid 78 hours over the fortnight; the additional time worked was always given back to them). I don't know numbers or percentages, but I believe only a minority of nurses are currently working fulltime. OK nurses on night duty working full hours do 12 hours nightly over 7 days (84 hours on which 6 hours are returned to them either in overtime or time off).
3. I can say what nurses pay actually is. I know the overtime rates, the night duty allowance, Sunday Rates, etc. They are no secret, a simple trek on the internet will show these rates.
4. Nurses do courses and they pay for them themselves. If they did the same courses in the UK, the NHS would pay for the courses.
5. For once, I agree with Delboy (above) the nurse on Liveline pissed me off too. The first casualty of any strike is the truth. This is no exception.
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There is a fund for nurses to do courses. My colleague did a course in UL which she funded herself, while a nurse on the same course was fully funded.
 
Let's keep with the full truth. A staff nurse doing a 78 hour fortnight gets basic pay €45701.00 per annum (€22.45 per hour). Add Qualification Entitlement (Higher Degree Alowance), Add Unit Allowance (not paid to some nurses), Add Sunday Allowance (an additional €22.45 per hour worked plus basic), Add Night Duty Allowance, Add Overtime, Add the Sunday Premium paid twice a Year (percentage of Sunday/BankHoliday hours worked over 6 months previously). These figures are for a Staff Nurse having gone through 12 annual increments and spending 3 years at the maximum of scale). I took the figures from the INMO website and are applicable since 1st January 2019. [A staff nurse at the top of scale working 12 hours overtime on a Sunday would earn €538.80 for that day alone].

There are some nurses getting paid much less than this, but that's another story. A senior staff nurse would be paid €47898.00 basic per annum.

Joe Public is not aware of these figures. Some of the nursing people interviewed recently by the press are not supplying the full truth regarding pay either.

Looking at the six oclock news tonight the INMO official gave superficial answers e.g We are not talking the number of Nurses, We're talking WTE's (whole time equivalents e.g two nurses working 19.5 hours weekly = 1 WTE). I wish the HSE and the Nurse Representatives and the Nurses would inform us of the full truth at all times. Half Truths are lies.

If anybody wises to dispute my figures, please do so. If this thread needs a nurse to contribute then let's hear from some.

Have you noticed the private hospitals seem unaffected by the strikes (and they get paid HSE rates)?
 
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Leper said:
Let's keep with the full truth. A staff nurse doing a 78 hour fortnight gets basic pay €45701.00 per annum (€22.45 per hour). Add Qualification Entitlement (Higher Degree Alowance), Add Unit Allowance (not paid to some nurses), Add Sunday Allowance (an additional €22.45 per hour worked plus basic), Add Night Duty Allowance, Add Overtime, Add the Sunday Premium paid twice a Year (percentage of Sunday/BankHoliday hours worked over 6 months previously). These figures are for a Staff Nurse having gone through 12 annual increments and spending 3 years at the maximum of scale). I took the figures from the INMO website and are applicable since 1st January 2019. [A staff nurse at the top of scale working 12 hours overtime on a Sunday would earn €538.80 for that day alone].

There are some nurses getting paid much less than this, but that's another story. A senior staff nurse would be paid €47898.00 basic per annum.

Joe Public is not aware of these figures. Some of the nursing people interviewed recently by the press are not supplying the full truth regarding pay either.

Looking at the six oclock news tonight the INMO official gave superficial answers e.g We are not talking the number of Nurses, We're talking WTE's (whole time equivalents e.g two nurses working 19.5 hours weekly = 1 WTE). I wish the HSE and the Nurse Representatives and the Nurses would inform us of the full truth at all times. Half Truths are lies.

If anybody wises to dispute my figures, please do so. If this thread needs a nurse to contribute then let's hear from some.

Have you noticed the private hospitals seem unaffected by the strikes (and they get paid HSE rates)?
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Watching rte interview any public sector union rep is like watching a game of softball
 
€22.45 per hour basic pay. A nurse on the news tonight claimed to be earning just above the minimum wage! Last week, think it was on the Seán O’Rourke show, a medical consultant claimed nurses earn no overtime payments and get no lunch break. His remarks went unchallenged. With such biased media, the government will never hold the line.
 
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