Nurses striking

[Polythene Pam]

The hospital I work at operated on a 96 year old, they gave her a new hip.
She hadn’t walked a single step in 6 years.

She died 4 weeks later.
(I believe from the trauma of it all)

The family wanted to try and see if she could walk again.

I know an 80 something year old who's on the waiting list for a shoulder replacement. I also know a 33 year old mother who is having to pay £750 a month towards her cancer treatment because the NHS doesn't fund the medication she needs.
Make it make sense.

The NHS definitely needs an overhaul and I think we need to be looking at the many other countries that offer free health care and do something similar

 

[Polythene Pam]

they know what pay

they know what payis when they enter, but presumably they also imagine it will increase as inflation does? not that they will be earning less than they were year on year?

Exactly. People might go into nursing (and other healthcare jobs) aware that they aren't ever going to make mega bucks, that's fine. But to say they should just put up and accept worsening conditions and less pay year on year is just insane.

No doubt a lot of the people who think they should are also the types that would object to foreign nurses being brought over to plug the gaps.

 

[Polythene Pam]

You have a childcare bill because you have had a child and decided to return to work. It’s not compulsory.

If nurses didn't return to work after having children there'd be barely any nurses.
Women are already having less children because childcare costs are untenable, and not returning to work is not an option for most.
No children = no future tax payers. Who the fuck is going to fund the NHS then? This government is so unbelievably shortsighted it's unreal

Where did I say we should all earn the same salary ?

You said you didn't get a pay rise so nurses shouldn't be asking for one. I personally think you should get a pay rise, there is plenty of money about to pay dividends but not staff.
British people absolutely love racing to the bottom. "I get by on £X so no one should have more". We're the fifth biggest economy in the world. We shouldn't have working poor people.

You have a childcare bill because you have had a child and decided to return to work. It’s not compulsory.

Also why is school free then?

That’s what labour laws are for. Striking is basically now all about pay.
I don’t disagree when it’s needed. I disagree with timing. The economy is sliding into the gutter and people are expecting more.
As I previously mentioned if this was a fee years from now when the economy picked up then I would be supportive.

Those labour laws were initiated by industrial action though. We can't rely on the government to sort it out, especially not the absolute scumbags running the show now.

The problem is we have had 12 years of low growth and stagnation. Nurses have taken a 20% pay cut in the last 10 years. So there is nothing left to give now. It's a problem of the government's making, we really can't be pointing the finger at public sector workers. No way is it easy for them.

Years from now we won't have an NHS to save. It's literally do or die.

 

[gigilouxx]

Nurses aren’t the only profession feeling the pinch - and? Why do people keep coming back to this argument? If you want to earn more unionise and strike yourselves

Are the staff in the medical field that blind and self absorbed to their own issues that they think the answer is “strike yourselves”
People can’t lose days of pay to strike, some people such as the police and the army aren’t even allowed to strike which is abhorrent. Some don’t strike because they’re in a sector that’s stretched and don’t want to cause additional problems to their colleagues.
Those who have no choice but to rely on agency work for shit money, no guaranteed hours and often piss poor working conditions can’t strike.
Why is no one allowed to have a bitter taste in their mouth that in the middle of a cost of living crisis where everyone’s skint, people are going without food and heating, that the ones making the biggest stink about their wages are on a decent salary.

 

[gigilouxx]

The first mention of Aldi that I saw was nurses saying they could “earn more if they left the NHS and worked in Aldi” then it went to them saying the people who work in Pret are on more money. The way nurses have come across during these strikes hasn’t been well at all, a lot of them seem to have a bag of chips on their shoulder and a stinking entitled attitude. Especially with the comments about “working through the pandemic”

 

[gigilouxx]

I don’t agree with the pointing the finger of “but people will die” unfortunately people die regardless and instead of playing the blame game the government need to do something before the whole country ends up in the toilet.

I’m fed up of the notion that NHS staff are always the worst off, they do deserve a pay rise, but we all as a collective also deserve affordable housing, childcare, a wider variation of training options to improve job prosperity. Like a previous poster said, this strike is to benefit nurses and nurses only.
Everyone has been hit by the state of the country, but it is wearing thin that the only people deemed worthy of a pay rise are the ones who aren’t really on low income as far as figures go. It’s a shit time for everyone and hopefully it sorts itself out soon

 

[Tui]

Still pro strike and happy a deal has been obtained but I do think comments comparing with Aldi workers are in very poor taste, not just nurses though, seen doctors doing the same on Twitter. You can make the point that your job is poorly compensated for the level of risk/responsibility and the conditions without punching down at what is undeniably seen as a 'menial' job, that's why it looks like HCPs are looking down on supermarket staff. Lets not forget that there will be staff in Aldi who have degrees and debt too, there are far more graduates than there are graduate jobs and many students work in supermarkets or retail/hospitality roles after they graduate, and supermarket workers are a weird one to have a pop at not least because they were also a group who had to keep working through the pandemic?! Yes, they weren't 'saving lives' but they were exposing themselves to COVID daily to keep us all fed, an extremely important job IMO.

I think such comments can be clumsy but ultimately I'd like to live in a society where we pay our doctors and nurses more than supermarket workers. Tough shit to anyone who disagrees with me.

 

[judgejohndeed]

What I don’t get is why people seem to think non graduate entry jobs should get paid the same as graduate entry jobs?

Because what is and isn't a 'graduate entry job' is so arbitrary. I think plumbers and electricians who don't go to uni provide a more valuable and important service to society than someone who did a history of arts degree and now works on the BBC graduate scheme, so it's fine to me if the former earns more despite being 'less educated'. Some nurses don't have degrees as historically it wasn't a graduate profession, should those nurses earn less than the new ones with less experience but have a degree? I also think it would be very undesirable to live in a society where only those who are academically gifted can ever reach the highest wages. There are plenty of more useful and important skills to have. Some vital jobs are also just extremely unappealing - I can't think of anything worse than hauling heavy stuff around until 3am, or driving long distances etc - and to make those jobs worth it they need decent salaries, whereas people with stupid degrees are falling over themselves to do cushty 9-5 graduate schemes. I don't think it's communism to think that there's more to salaries than education, to me that's an extremely crude measure and I say that as someone who has several degrees.

 

[judgejohndeed]

I just think we’re missing the point that nursing is a highly skilled job requiring a degree so Aldi shouldn’t really be our yardstick unless it’s a comparable job with comparable skills and responsibility. It’s pointless repeating this though.

You're entitled to your opinion but it does blow my mind somewhat that you're still flogging this horse when you literally just demonstrated that you don't even understand what working in Aldi entails (i.e. the comment about Aldi workers not working overnight)
Plus there's different kinds of nursing anyway just as there are different kinds of retail etc. Should an A&E nurse get paid more than someone on a checkout? Probably. Should a GP nurse who works a 9-5 sitting down get paid more than an Aldi worker shifting heavy stuff around on the night shift? Not convinced personally.

 

[Campari]

They are some of the lowest paid nurses in Europe.

They're really not. The EU average nurse wage is £31600. That's lower than UK nurse wage wage. In Norway nurses only make a few thousand more but the cost of living is nearly double. When misinformation like this is pedalled it makes it hard to trust them.
The union's are as full as much crap as the government.
+ Nurses have a super generous pension. Everyone is struggling at the moment, nurses still have a pretty good deal. Of course some are finding it tough, like millions of others. But taxing others who are struggling just as much (probably more) or loading up on debt for people to pay in the future is not good either. Nurses need a bit of balance and look outside of their own bubble and the shite that unions pedal to justify their existence.

 

[OnlyHereForTheLolz]

To be honest there is little comparison between a retail worker and a nurse. Nurses are degree educated, skilled professionals, and the pay structure absolutely does not reflect the diversity of the modern nursing profession and the complexity of modern medical practice. Nurses are also a captive workforce, there are few opportunities to work as a nurse outside of the NHS, although they exist they are limited and not comparable to NHS work. Ultimately the government needs nurses, doctors, paramedics etc and needs to be prepared to pay for them and if those professional groups feel they are not being paid properly then the pay of other groups like retail workers is totally irrelevant.
Working conditions for NHS staff are absolutely fucking awful right now and if you haven’t experienced it yourself I honestly don’t think many can imagine it. Retail work is grim too but it just does not compare and ultimately if you don’t like working for one company you can leave but the NHS is shit everywhere. Changing those conditions is not going to happen overnight whereas pay *restoration* could, because what nurses are asking for is effectively pay restoration for 10-12 years of pay degradation. Who is going to want to be a nurse right now? Hospitals are dangerous places to be.

This right here is what is wrong with people and why my respect is dwindling.
Already the “we are better and therefore deserve more” is starting.
I couldn’t even get past the first few sentences before what you said showed how little you think of others.

 

[cee-bee]

The trouble is, after over a decade of cuts in the public sector the chickens are coming home to roost.

So many of our vital services have been in fire fighting mode for so long, is hard to switch to forward thinking risk planning.

It’s not just the public sector - barristers have been impacted. Young criminal barristers basically work less than minimum wage. None of them want to go into criminal law because it’s so poorly paid. Why is it so poorly paid? Because of cuts to legal aid.
Who got the masses all riled about about legal aid? The daily effing Mail and tabloid press.

Legal aid doesn’t exist to protect criminals, it exists to ensure fair and safe trials can happen, which means criminals are put behind bars and punished. Removing it has served as a gift to criminals and devastating for those whose are innocent.

less barristers means trials become postponed and delayed, meaning people are free to continue criminality, free to evade justice and closes it off as a career to anyone who isn’t well off. And since so many criminal judges in the Supreme Court have had to have done a stint in criminal law, we are effectively removing a route for working class, aspirational lawyers into one of the UK’s most important and influential roles - a judge. The fact that barristers who, as a profession have rarely ever gone on strike, should be a real wake up call to those saying we are in the “grip of socialism” and the pesky public sector is just being greedy. It’s not about greed at all.

The daily Mail and tabloid press don’t provide decent, well balanced news. The aim for clicks and sales. They manipulate your emotions, they don’t engage your mind. By all means, read if you want a different perspective or a bit of silly fun but for the love of good, read a decent newspaper to counterbalance it and don’t parrot headlines like they are fact.

 

[Tui]

Well yes, aren't you a doctor? I'm sure you do. Last sentence is hardly a compelling argument and proves the point that it looks like snobbery.

It’s not snobbery to believe that professions *requiring* a university education and a high skill base with high levels of responsibility should be paid more than jobs which don’t have those things. I’ve worked in retail, it’s shit as the public treat you terribly and it could be physically tiring but it wasn’t intellectually taxing. Do we really expect prospective medical students, in the top 5% academically, to take on £50k+ debt and a ton of responsibility when the NHS is delivering substandard care due to years of neglect, when they could go work literally anywhere else? Same for nurses, how else can we attract people to the profession ? Changes to the culture and conditions of the NHS will take years by comparison to keeping pay in line with inflation.
Anyone who genuinely thinks doctors and nurses should earn the same as retail workers etc is lying to themselves

 

[Mrhopalot]

I voted to strike, for me it was an easy decision. When the media tells you patients will die because we’re out on the picket line. Here’s a fact, people are dying every single day, preventable accidents are happening every single day. Departments are staffed at unsafe levels every single day. It simply cannot continue, we have highly skilled staff leaving daily as they can’t take it no more, we can’t recruit and retain.
In real terms of GDP our NHS has been massively underfunded, multiple community services have gone. We are seeing patients at the front door of AED who do not need to be there.
We have the Health Secretary telling us to suck it up as we have a good pension, we are taking money away from patient care. We haven’t had any adequate funding to provide good patient care for years! It’s like a postcode lottery for what services you can access. This is not proving a good standard of care.
Of course I want to be paid fairly , we’ve been robbed of fair pay for too long. Just because we’re in the caring profession doesn’t mean we should suck it up and struggle financially until we reach pension age, that’s if we make it to pension age.
Those opposed to striking are you happy with the current care offered?
What do you suggest instead of striking?

 

[JoeBloggs]

I think sympathy is running out more because people unfortunately do have to live on a lot less than the workers striking. Same as the notion that nurses are relying on food banks, plenty of people on less aren’t relying on them. The wider issues need looking at, private rents are absolutely sickening at the minute, ex council houses still on council estates going for £700/£800 a month whereas the house next door is half of that, there’s no logic in it

Exactly, that nurse quoted further up who said she brings home £2,200. So that is £33,000 a year. That is a good wage, my husband is a manager in retail and that's his wage. We also live in Surrey and a 2 bed to rent in our area isn't as much as she has quoted at £1,600. Something just doesn't add up imo.

That leaves her with £800 a month, for so many thats a lot. I get that bills are higher than ever but this isn't something that is just effecting nurses, it is effecting us all no matter our income.

 

[Emsie]

Maybe an unpopular opinion but one thing I don’t agree with is student nurses thinking they should be paid for training work. They aren’t the only ones who have to work to qualify for their degree. It’s horrible having to work for free obviously but whenever I see student nurses post about it they always make out it’s only them that has to do it. Imo it should be the people who supervise/train them that get paid more.

Same with paying for their pin and parking. Plenty of people have to pay professional memberships and we all pay our own parking.

 

[Hairraiser]

I completely agree as a doctor. I often look around and wonder why the feck are we putting 90 year olds through invasive procedures, scanning to look for cancers, round after round of antibiotics, I’ve even seen critical care getting called to see frail elderly patients for ?HDU/ICU. I do feel this is worse since COVID, I think partially because we cannot give good basic care anymore we try to do as much as possible even when we shouldn’t. Some of it is definitely unrealistic expectations also. But I think we are a victim of our own success in being able to extend peoples lives but also extend the period of time they spend unwell.

The hospital I work at operated on a 96 year old, they gave her a new hip.
She hadn’t walked a single step in 6 years.

She died 4 weeks later.
(I believe from the trauma of it all)

The family wanted to try and see if she could walk again.

 

[shifttea]

I’m an ex nurse and would never go back because it’s just not nursing any more. I liked the hands on approach. Spending my day giving out meds and keyboard bashing and shouting for the healthcare assistant when a patient wants to go to the toilet is not my idea of nursing. My friend is an HCA and they do the bulk of the work, blood tests, taking observations, feeding, washing, dressings etc. They aren’t striking, if they did the NHS would fall apart.
Nurses are vital, but they aren’t in the real world if they think they are going to get 16 percent.
The NHS needs a massive overhaul starting with nurses training going back to basics, and stop relying on the overworked and poorly paid HCAs
Rant over

I know this is an older post, but I just want to say I agree. I work in a private nursing home as a HCA. the nurses do their med rounds and then sit at the computer all day. they get paid twice what I do. I do all of the personal care, feeding, catheter care, skincare, oral care. I make notes of any concerns, I do heights and weights monthly, I do the obs, I get to know my residents and their families.

my mum is a HCA in the NHS and she says it's much the same for her. we both now have the view that HCA's are the "traditional" nurses that actually care for patients, whereas trained nurses are more admin folk that anything else.

I know that this isn't how it is everywhere, just before anyone grabs their pitchfork. I know plenty of nurses do actually work, and plenty of HCA's are lazy twats, but in general, HCA's are doing most of the work now.

Nurses need better pay, but so do HCA's. what we get paid does absolutely not reflect the enormity of our tasks. I love my job, I love caring for my residents, when they pass I grieve for them, but I am also frustrated. society in general looks down on myself and other HCA's. this is not some unskilled job that anyone can do. it's physically and mentally exhausting, and I do it for £10.50 an hour.

Sooner or later, HCA's will strike, and all hell will break loose.

anyway, rant over

 

[JoeBloggs]

This is just spot on.
It's a struggle for everyone!
Yes nurses worked in the pandemic (it's your literal job) but so did lots and lots of people. Yes nurses deserve a payrise. As does everyone.
All this 20 per cent real terms pay cut.. again the same for everyone. No working people got a pay rise in line with inflation and if you rely on benefits you're even more fucked.
I earn 34k and I'm not relying on a foodbank?! Plenty of people who earn less are not relying on foorbanks.
All the points above about childcare and housing are absolutely relevant and that's what needs to change.

THIS!! All retail workers, cleaners, bin men etc who also worked through the pandemic, exposing themselves being abused by the public they also deserve pay rises but because they aren’t civil servants they are seen as a lessor citizen.

Everyone deserves a pay rise but we are in a recession, after a pandemic with world war three possibly on the card. Everyone is in the shit with those in power having no idea while they drink £100 bottles of wine at lunch.

 

[wearedoomed]

It’s time to completely change how the NHS is funded. We can’t have low taxes and a universal health service.

We need a separate health tax that everyone pays into. And a complete reorganisation of the management structure to do less bean counting.

Make sure GP surgeries are operating sufficiently enough so that people aren’t attending A&E for every ailment.

I don’t know if hospitals have subsidised accommodation for medical staff, but in areas particularly with high housing costs this needs to be an option.