Hundreds of nurses and midwives from across the Hunter New England Health district walked off the job today as part of statewide strike action to highlight the NSW Government’s refusal to negotiate safe staffing in public hospitals.
Despite a statewide order to cancel demonstrations by the Industrial Relation Commission, NSW Nurses and Midwives Association (NSWNMA) members from 23 branches in the Hunter New England Local Health District attended the strike at Newcastle’s Civic Park.
They implored the NSW Premier, Dominic Perrottet, to implement shift by shift nursing and midwifery staffing for safe patient care.
In a media release on February 11, NSWNMA General Secretary Brett Holmes said the strike was a culmination of ten years of inaction by the government and its refusal to negotiate with nurses and midwives to secure safe staffing during hospital shifts.
“Our members have signalled how fed up they are with the NSW Government for continuing to ignore the need for nurse-to-patient ratios on every shift, similar to those already working successfully in Queensland and Victoria,” Holmes said.
“What we’re asking for is not unreasonable. nurse-to-patient ratios do save lives and result in better patient outcomes.”
Thousands of nurses and midwives from more than 150 public hospitals and health services planned to strike statewide after 99 per cent of the NSWNMA branches voted in favour of strike action.
“Nurses and midwives across NSW have had to fight to be safe at work during the current pandemic,” said Holmes, adding that “fit testing, workers’ compensation and leave entitlements have been a constant battle under this government,” Holmes said.
“Working conditions have deteriorated as staff vacancies increased, admissions have skyrocketed, and untrained staff have been introduced into care models.”
He said all of this impacted the level of care nurses and midwives could provide to patients in the health system.
In addition to their request for nurse-to-patient ratios in every hospital, Holmes confirmed NSWNMA members were seeking a fair pay rise above 2.5 per cent for recognition of nurses and midwives workloads during the pandemic and to compensate for their wage freeze in 2020.
The union is also seeking a withdrawal of the amendment to the Workers Compensation Act that would force workers to prove they contracted COVID-19 at work.
Holmes said that COVID-19 had exacerbated the failings of the NSW health system and highlighted the “disrespect” shown to nurses and midwives by the state government.
“The platitudes will not be enough to sustain our already fatigued and diminished health workforce.”
Hunter nurses paint bleak picture of a system under strain
NSWNMA union organiser, John Paul Marx, led the emotionally-charged rally in Newcastle’s CBD.
“Nurses and midwives across the state have been expected to cope with ill-prepared consequences of a let it rip strategy, a strategy that has overwhelmed our health system and resulted in 1000 lives lost to COVID-19 in NSW alone,” Marx said.
“Comrades we say to the government, enough is enough. The time to act has come, and it is now.
“This government is on notice that nurses and midwives will take further actions until our ratio claim is won.”
The NSWNMA has insisted on a 1:3 nurse to patient ratio in emergency departments and a 1:4 nurse to patient ratio on the floor.
Marx said that patient loads were currently anything from 1:6 or 1:10.
NSWNMA Branch Secretary at Maitland Mental Health Unit Laura Kibble painted a bleak picture of the physical consequences local nurses have endured in the work environment.
“There are members of my branch who have been slapped, punched, kicked, spat on, strangled and been sexually assaulted in our workplace,” Kibble said.
“We’ve been bruised, we’ve lost teeth, we’ve broken bones, and we’ve experienced symptoms of psychological distress including nightmares and panic attacks around coming to work.”
She insisted that safe staffing ratios were the “only reliable and effective solution in the workplace.”
Kibble also revealed personal disillusionment with a profession she once loved.
“I do not feel proud to be a nurse today. I became a nurse because I wanted to serve my community,” Kibble said.
“I wanted to transform peoples lives, so every time I have to fob a patient off because I’m too busy with a time-limited task to do my job and listen to them, my heart breaks again.”
Kibble also scolded the government’s meagre provision of duress alarms and cameras for staff safety and protection, saying the measures are inadequate as “technology fails”.
“All of us in my branch know that when we have the opportunity to know patients well, we recognise the early warning signs, and we can intervene before a patient is unwell enough [to put themselves or nurses at risk],” Kibble said.
John Hunter Nurse and branch secretary Joanne Patterson, who has been working in the profession for over 40 years, said that simple nurse comradeship had held the system together.
“We as nurses have always supported each other, and this is what these governments have relied on – that we always pick up extra shifts or did the overtime because we wouldn’t let our mates down,” Patterson said.
Current arrangement a “dirty secret”, says local nurse
NSWNMA Branch Secretary at Maitland Hospital Kathy Chapman lamented the “ridiculous arrangement” that was nurse hours to patient days, which results in inadequate patient care and inevitable neglect.
Chapman said she was passionate about seeing the current nursing hours arrangement replaced by a nurse to patient ratio.
“The biggest thing is we’re looking for safe patient care, and we can get that with a ratio agreement,” she said.
The nursing hours per patient day is the current industrial award NSW hospitals operate under, which dictate how the government provides public facilities with funding for nurses to care for patients.
“At Maitland hospital, for every patient we have at midnight, the government will provide funding of six hours nursing care … so that equals about 2 hours per shift for each patient if you’ve only got four patients,” Chapman said.
“We want ratios, so one nurse looks after four in a ward, then that could be mandated.
“If the policy is changed to suit the demands of the NSWNMA, it won’t be legally possible for hospitals to allocate a particular nurse with extra patients like current practice allows.
“If we have a nurse away from the hospital, we can’t always replace that nurse, so then one nurse may be looking after 10-12 patients for a few hours until that nurse returns.”
“It really is a dirty little secret that the government hides … I think once everyone understands nursing hours and how ineffective and how unsafe it is, nothing will stop us from moving forward.”
At the Civic Park rally, it was also revealed that midwives are responsible for up to six mothers and six newborns during a shift.
“Midwives can actually have six mothers that might have one to two babies each … but the babies don’t actually count as part of their care,” Chapman said.
“Some babies are born unhealthy and require a lot of care so that the midwives may be looking after six women and six to 10 babies as well. That’s unusual for people to have twins, but regardless, babies matter.”
“It’s not just about nurses, it impacts patients… nurses can’t split themselves in two, so [patients] are waiting longer for their medications, for showering and even just basic hygiene care.
“I can’t believe our community don’t realise what the government is actually doing … we’re sick of it, and we’re at the end of our tether.”
The strike is the first-time nurses and midwives have walked off the job in nearly a decade.
Chapman, employed at the new Maitland Hospital, said staffing pressures associated with the current budget were exacerbated locally by a larger facility still operating at inadequate staffing capacities of the previous hospital.
“It’s been made worse because we’re now at this new hospital which is a lot larger, and we still don’t have the staffing and the capacity to care for our patients,” she said.
NSW Government ignores pleas
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet dismissed calls for staffing ratios similar to those enacted in Queensland and Victoria.
“The advice that I’ve received is that there are substantive challenges to that, and it hasn’t actually worked so well in other states,” he said.
He said he would support nurses’ rights to industrial action but did not want to see a year of rolling strikes.
“What I want is reasonable, robust discussions to get outcomes. Let’s not play politics. We don’t want to get back to the old union games.”
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard labelled the nurses and midwives strike over pay and work conditions as “unfortunate” and warned that those participating might face disciplinary action after defying the Industrial Relation Commission order against protesting.
The Health minister ruled out improving staff to patient ratios, suggesting it would cost the state $1B.
“We are doing everything we can on that front … we’re trying to find a way forward to make sure there’s some further recognition of the amazing work nurses and midwives do,” Hazzard said.
“But the union is asking for (greater nurse to patient ratios) … it would cost a billion dollars when we already spend 30 per cent of the state’s budget on health.
“It would mean we would have nurses sitting in empty wards when there are no patients because it would come down to the ratio.”
Alongside the Newcastle Rally, other major regional rallies occurred in Sydney, Bathurst, Bega, Coffs Harbour, Lismore, Newcastle and Tamworth.
The NSWNMA has reiterated its willingness to hold discussions with the NSW Premier and has not ruled out further action over the coming months to secure safe working conditions for its members.
Maia O’Connor