News NHS strikes

[Ann Chovie]

Just drove through three picket lines on my way into work today at the the hospital.

Staff at all levels apparently including nurses and ambulance staff are on strike from 7-11 then work to rule for I believe it is four days?

Picket lines here were poorly manned with just four or five people maximum braving the wind and rain to picket.

Seems in the Chemotherapy ward I work to be 'work as normal '. I hear from a friend who is a midwife that the percentage of those honouring the strike is low here.

Anyone know if it is better supported elsewhere in UK?

Do you think it is justified? And if so , do you think a few hours of strike will drive home the point or make a difference ?

Or should they have gone for more radical S*** or bust tactics?

I am not sure how I feel on this one, I obviously work with hospital staff day in day out, I know the shortages, the work loads and the low pay and the stress. They have my undying respect and gratitude for the work they do.

But..I also know that for the rest of us in all areas of employment there is also pressure and in my case no wage rise for the six years I have been in this job despite rising living costs.

Should those in essential services strike because they know what devastation it will cause where the rest of us do not bother because we hardly be missed for 4 hours anyway??

Not a pop at anyone ..just wondering what members standpoint on this is?

 

[Second Summer]

My understanding is that the income inequality in this country and elsewhere in the western world is at an all-time high. (Or at least higher than in decades.) So despite the BS about us all being in it together, the rich and spoiled are eating their cake as usual.

A strike is not enough to change the injustice inherent in the system, though. More radical action is needed.

If you've not had a wage rise in six years, then that sounds criminal to me.

 

[Ann Chovie]

My understanding is that the income inequality in this country and elsewhere in the western world is at an all-time high. (Or at least higher than in decades.) So despite the BS about us all being in it together, the rich and spoiled are eating their cake as usual.

A strike is not enough to change the injustice inherent in the system, though. More radical action is needed.

If you've not had a wage rise in six years, then that sounds criminal to me.

It certainly does not feel very just or fair.. but in the area I work we are dependant predominantly on funding for survival and the fact that we are now fighting not only other agencies but also private buisness for contracts then we have to be as lean and keen as we can be.

We have faced two rounds of redundancies and are always in threat of closure.

Management position on lack of increase has always been that you have seen how many people have been made redundant just remember that you are lucky you have a job at all if we pay you more we will not win the contracts anyway!!!! Its all team work and pulling together for the common good..easier to swallow on a managment £40k salary than our £20k one I should imagine!!

No equality for staff in the area I work ..fighting for social justice and equality appears not to extend to staff.

 

[Second Summer]

I came across this - numbers from a couple of years ago, but I imagine it's only gotten worse since then:

 

[Ann Chovie]

I came across this - numbers from a couple of years ago, but I imagine it's only gotten worse since then:

Interesting but depressing reading Indian Summer

 

[Clueless Git]

Bearing in mind that when elections come around voting for full blown communism is always an option ...

People seem perfectly happy to vote themselves a 99% guarantee of lower than average income in return for the remaining 1% chance of earning above it.

I'm surprised no one has ever exploited this mentality by starting a 4billion chances of losing your rent money against 1 chance of becoming an instant millionaire style lottery.

 

[Clueless Git]

Not a pop at anyone ..just wondering what members standpoint on this is?

My standpoint is that I find it funny that the human flocks don't like it too much when it's them that's getting the fleecing.

No sympathy at all for those who are happy to exploit those further down the ladder but squeal like the farmer's prettiest pig when they get exploited by those higher up it.

There's a word for those who refrain from exploitation and thus are not hypocrits to complain if they fall victim to it.

That word is 'vegan'.

Anyone else is just getting a teensy taste of their own medicine. If it tastes nasty then maybe they should go vegan and do their bit towards putting a lid on that particular bottle.

 

[ledboots]

Just drove through three picket lines on my way into work today at the the hospital.

Staff at all levels apparently including nurses and ambulance staff are on strike from 7-11 then work to rule for I believe it is four days?

Picket lines here were poorly manned with just four or five people maximum braving the wind and rain to picket.

Seems in the Chemotherapy ward I work to be 'work as normal '. I hear from a friend who is a midwife that the percentage of those honouring the strike is low here.

Anyone know if it is better supported elsewhere in UK?

Do you think it is justified? And if so , do you think a few hours of strike will drive home the point or make a difference ?

Or should they have gone for more radical S*** or bust tactics?

I am not sure how I feel on this one, I obviously work with hospital staff day in day out, I know the shortages, the work loads and the low pay and the stress. They have my undying respect and gratitude for the work they do.

But..I also know that for the rest of us in all areas of employment there is also pressure and in my case no wage rise for the six years I have been in this job despite rising living costs.

Should those in essential services strike because they know what devastation it will cause where the rest of us do not bother because we hardly be missed for 4 hours anyway??

Not a pop at anyone ..just wondering what members standpoint on this is?

In the US in the 1980s, nurses struck at some hospitals. Understaffing, lack of training and supplies, low pay, firing of RNs for LPNs, forced overtime, etc made for unsafe patient care.

My cousin struck at her hospital in Boston--I think it was Mass General or Brigham Women's. Anyway, they got the mandatory overtime repealed and some more nurses hired. And a few years later when the studies came out about more people dying in hospitals with fewer RNs, they went back to hiring.

 

[Second Summer]

There's a word for those who refrain from exploitation and thus are not hypocrits to complain if they fall victim to it.

That word is 'vegan'.

Anyone else is just getting a teensy taste of their own medicine. If it tastes nasty then maybe they should go vegan and do their bit towards putting a lid on that particular bottle.

Well, animal exploitation isn't the only exploitation in the world. There are also sweatshops and modern slave labour, some of it involving children working in unsafe environments / factories.

 

[Ann Chovie]

In the US in the 1980s, nurses struck at some hospitals. Understaffing, lack of training and supplies, low pay, firing of RNs for LPNs, forced overtime, etc made for unsafe patient care.

My cousin struck at her hospital in Boston--I think it was Mass General or Brigham Women's. Anyway, they got the mandatory overtime repealed and some more nurses hired. And a few years later when the studies came out about more people dying in hospitals with fewer RNs, they went back to hiring.

According to my friend who is a midwife here, the forced overtime is so extreme that the midwifes are working two sometimes three consecutive shifts simply because the staffing levels have been thinned down so far that if they did not patients would simply not have a midwife on the ward at all. The patient to nurse ratio is terrifying and the only surprise is that so few incidents do occur.

She told me that midwifes are starting shifts already exhausted and tearful, knowing that they are not capable of carrying out a professional job, so worried are they that some insist on having it recorded on the shift 'log' the numbers of hours they have worked without sleep and the potential risk to patients as a result.

 

[Second Summer]

When our daughter was born at the hospital in Oxford, the level of care and expertise present at the actual birth seemed quite good. I think there were at least 10 doctors and nurses in the room. However, the level of care in the ward after the birth was lacking and substandard. It got a little better later on when they got transferred to another ward. This was nearly 3 years ago, so not sure if things have changed.

 

[Clueless Git]

Well, animal exploitation isn't the only exploitation in the world. There are also sweatshops and modern slave labour, some of it involving children working in unsafe environments / factories.

Aye, it is that kind of thing I was thinking of, IS.

From the extremes you mentioned right through to the mere wage slavery of the technicaly free and definitely better off of us.