5 days ago
Christchurch Hospital staff poised to strike for two hours Friday afternoon
Nurses last struck for better staffing levels in July.
Photo:
RNZ/Calvin Samuel
Nurses on three wards at Christchurch Hospital will walk off the job on Friday afternoon to protest chronic staffing shortages.
The Nurses' Organisation (NZNO) said union members in theatre, post-anaesthetic care and radiology would strike for two hours from 2pm.
NZNO Christchurch Hospital theatre delegate Gayl Marryatt said the strike was a result of the desperate staffing issues faced by members on a daily basis that had not been resolved in bargaining with Health New Zealand.
"We hear of staff on the wards going home in tears, because they can't provide the care that they feel the patients need," she said. "The medications and treatments are getting delayed, because they just don't have the time to get round all their patients.
"I've heard of hospital aids who sit with patients on the ward and that patient, in an entire shift, doesn't see a nurse, because they have a hospital aid with them, because nurses are dealing with sicker patients.
"We are taking this action so Te Whatu Ora recognises there are not enough nurses, midwives, healthcare assistants and kaimahi hauora [health workers]."
Health New Zealand encouraged the union to return to bargaining.
"We are aware that NZNO have issued a strike notice for a two-hour withdrawal of labour tomorrow from 2-4pm, covering Christchurch Hospital members working in perioperative, theatres and radiology services," said industrial relations executive lead Robyn Shearer.
"Contingency plans are in place to ensure the continued delivery of health services during the strike."
Shearer said the NZNO withdrew a two-hour strike notice in Christchurch on Wednesday on behalf of perioperative, theatre and radiology services staff, shortly before they were due to walk off the job.
"Given the notice, Health NZ contingency planners prepared accordingly, and postponed planned care and first specialist appointments in the impacted departments," she said. "The strike notice was lifted 45 minutes before the action was due to start, leaving no time to re-instate the postponed planned care and appointments.
"Health NZ is deeply concerned at these actions and the impacts this will have on the 85 patients, who had their care postponed yesterday.
"While we recognise the right of NZNO members to strike, actions such as those taken yesterday in Christchurch have real impacts on patients."
Nurses planned to hold nationwide industrial action on 2 September and 4 September, calling for
better nurse-to-patient ratios
and a return to hiring every graduate.
Health NZ said it was deeply concerned by September's strike plans, which it said would cause the postponement of more than 2200 planned procedures, 3600 first-specialist appointments and 8000 follow-up appointments.
Nurses last went on strike in late July, [
with similar demands].
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