For the third week in a row, nurses and midwives are taking action for better wages and conditions across two states.
Unrest in the nursing sector grew today with two groups in two states launching industrial action against their employers.
Last week public hospital nurses and midwives in NSW held a 24-hour strike amid allegations that the state government was discriminating against female-dominated professions after granting NSW police an almost 40% pay rise.
The week before that, nurses and midwives employed by private hospital operators Healthscope held a series of two and three-hour stoppages for improved pay and conditions.
Today, in Victoria, almost 1000 nurses and midwives across St Vincent’s Private Hospitals’ four Melbourne healthcare facilities began protected industrial action at 7am.
It is the first time St Vincent’s Private Hospitals Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation members have taken industrial action in the union’s 123-year history.
The ANMF’s Victorian branch has been negotiating a new enterprise agreement since June with St Vincent’s Private Hospitals management for its hospitals in Fitzroy, East Melbourne, Kew and Werribee.
The ANMF is seeking pay parity with public sector nurses and midwives including new and improved allowances and more than 40 improved entitlements and working conditions such as superannuation on paid and unpaid parental leave.
Importantly, the Federation is also seeking improved staffing levels and safer patient care in the form of transparent, minimum nurse/midwife patient ratios in line with Victoria’s Safe Patient Care Act 2015, noting that the employer negotiated staffing ratios into the enterprise agreement for three St Vincent’s Private Hospitals in NSW in late 2023.
The four Victorian St Vincent’s Private Hospitals facilities do not have ratios or transparent staffing levels.
St Vincent’s Private Hospitals has made an offer for a two-year agreement that maintains parity with public sector pay rates but does not include the new or significantly improved allowances.
It has also rejected the implementation of ratios or the inclusion of any of the public sector nurses’ and midwives’ more than 40 entitlements and working conditions achieved in the last two enterprise agreements.
ANMF members’ stage one protected industrial action includes: wearing red campaign t-shirts, speaking to residents, family, the community and the media about their campaign, administrative bans, a ban on non-clinical paperwork linked to funding, a ban on admin related to billing clients and a ban on overtime.
“Private health insurance companies made a record $2.2 billion profit in 2022-23 and they cannot continue make billions at the expense of private hospital nurses’ and midwives’ wages, conditions and safer staffing levels and patient care,” said ANMF Victoria’s acting secretary Madeleine Harradence.
“It’s crunch time for the private acute hospital sector because it is a really difficult time in history to retain and recruit a stable nursing and midwifery workforce.
“While wages are important, St Vincent’s Private Hospitals must address understaffing and safe patient workloads.”
In June, the ANMF secured a 28.4% (compounded) pay increase for Victorian public sector nurses and midwives, new and significantly improved allowances to incentivise a permanent workforce plus significant improvements to entitlements and working conditions.
“The 2024-28 Victorian public sector nurses and midwives agreement is now the benchmark for all private acute sector employers,” Ms Harradence said.
“This is the first time St Vincent’s Private Hospitals ANMF members have taken industrial action in our union’s 123-year history, which demonstrates how strongly they care about safer staffing levels, which is not only an important workload mechanism but we know leads to safer patient outcomes.
“Nurses and carers only take industrial action as a last resort when their employer is not listening and we reassure St Vincent’s Private patients and their families that their health, safety and welfare will not be at risk,” she said.
Meanwhile, in NSW today, nurses and midwives working for Ramsay Health Care, the country’s largest private hospital provider, walked off the job for four hours at St George Private Hospital, as they continue to call on Ramsay Health Care to put staff and patients before profits.
Operating theatres were closed and there was a ban on working overtime.
More than 50 strikes have taken place across NSW Ramsay hospitals since members voted to take protected industrial action in July this year. Members of the NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association are calling for a 20% wage increase over three years, and safe staffing ratios for all wards and units in their NSW hospitals.
No deal has been struck after 20 months of negotiations between the NSWNMA and Ramsay.
Nurses and midwives are also refusing to fill out charge sheets and carry out non-clinical duties such as answering phones, checking stock, emptying bins, cleaning, and food or drink service.