Nurses ballot on action over lack of staff

PATIENTS at four provincial hospitals face industrial action by nurses angry at inadequate staffing levels.

Nurses, who staged a lunchtime protest in Mullingar yesterday, continued a work-to-rule overnight as unions and the Midland Health Board prepare to go before the Labour Relations Court today.

Nurses in Carlow yesterday voted overwhelmingly for industrial action, while ballots commence today in Bantry and Cashel hospitals, where inadequate staffing levels are being challenged by the Irish Nurses Organisation.

The nursing union warned staff cutbacks were putting an extra workload on overburdened members.

INO industrial relations officer Tony Fitzpatrick said, in the affected hospitals, it was almost impossible for nurses to ensure a delivery of high-quality care.

He described as draconian the health board’s sick leave policy at the Sacred Heart Hospital in Carlow. He said staff on sick leave were not being replaced for seven days while, in some cases, no cover was being provided for staff on annual leave.

Mr Fitzpatrick said a ballot at Our Lady’s Hospital in Cashel was unavoidable due to inadequate and unsafe staffing levels.

“The levels in the operating theatre department are totally unacceptable and fall far below the levels in comparable theatre departments in the SEHB,” he said.

Health boards, however, insist that due to budgetary constraints, they are unable to provide additional staffing. The Midland Health Board, meanwhile, appealed to nurses in Mullingar to call off industrial action pending the outcome of planned conciliation talks at the LRC.

The region’s INO industrial relations officer, Patsy Doyle, said the board failed to engage effectively in talks since October last after nurses made demands for safe staffing levels and improved management structure.

“We are disappointed the board ignored our legitimate claim,” she said. “Staffing levels at the theatre in Mullingar Hospital are not safe and we were left with no option but to confine ourselves to strict nursing duties.”

Meanwhile, SIPTU postponed indefinitely a ward attendants’ dispute at six psychiatric and geriatric units in Dublin following assurances an 8% pay increase would be fully addressed.

SIPTU official Ramon O’Reilly said the claim was being dealt with under a profiling pay determination system.

The dispute in the eastern region centred on the issue of bringing ward attendants’ pay to the same level as those working in the Dublin teaching hospitals.