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"THIS is a dispute we didn't want but now that we are here the resolve and determination among all nurses is stronger than ever. Despite the stories in the media, we are not neglecting our patients. I haven't come across one negative comment about the dispute from patients or relatives in Cork. In fact, because we don't have to spend so much time on administrative duties we are spending more time with our patients. We gave health management 60 days' notice of this action. If things are falling apart, it is management who are at fault.
"The HSE has had two years now to get the new structures right and it hasn't worked. We are top heavy with management yet very little has been spent on frontline staff. We need more beds, not more managers. It is not a pay rise we want, it is a correction of an anomaly where childcare staff are paid more than the professional nurses they report to. On the reduced working week, 27 years ago the Labour Court ruled that nurses were entitled to a 35-hour week and we still haven't got it. Isn't it ironic that the managers who refuse to give it to us themselves enjoy a 33to 35-hour working week?
"We don't want to escalate the action this week but if it has to be done then nurses are up for it. But patients will be foremost in our thoughts.
"We guarantee there will be full emergency cover next week and patients will not suffer. We would ask Mary Harney and the government to be more flexible and imaginative in resolving this dispute, as they were in the Northern Ireland peace process."
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YOU ARE HERE: 11 November 2007 / tribune.ie / 2007 / 04 / 08
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