The Nurses.

Supercell · 07-04-2007 10:22PM

PeakOutput wrote:

all ill say is that changing the government is the best that cn come out of it if the lose 40K votes but it still wont get the nurses what they want.........the next government wont give them it either...COZ IT MAKES NO ECONOMIC SENSE

The polititions care more about removing Stamp Duty (give money back to the rich by taxing the poor) than they do about people that care for us, says it all for Irish society

PeakOutput · 07-04-2007 10:23PM

Longfield wrote:

Am amazed at the lack of support for the nurses here, just what is wrong with our society?

what is wrong is that society realises the only thing that can come of giving into their demands is a worse health care system and a chain effect of public service pay claims

Nurses are highly trained individuals that work all hours to save peoples lives.
Just how the hell is that not something to be rewarded in a crappy salary of 30K?? (I heard on the radio today)

they are all of the above they also chose to pursue that career path and could of dropped out of college at any point if they found they did not like the work. they are among the best paid nurses in europe (again is till think they probably deserve a pay increase despite the above)

Without them our hospitals and heathcare system would collapse. They do work they many of us wouldnt dream of doing - change some old guys piss bag, wipe another wrinkly arse after a ****e, gave comfort to some who's loved one just died, held a scared persons hand before they entered the operating theatre.

without any of the different job descriptions the healthcare system would fall apart thats not an argument

It's not the glamour side of medical care, but jesus these people are essential to our health care system and should be given a decent wage for the essential work they do.

again they are essential just like every other cog in the machine(besides the overly large proportion of admin probably) and again they are among the best paid nurses in europe

We ALL grow old, have relatives or loved ones that need medical care at some point, and guess who will be caring for them during their stay in the hospital? - yep the nurses.

yep it will be them and we appreciate it.....but its no excuse to bring the system to its knees coz they feel like throwing a tantrum

PeakOutput · 07-04-2007 10:25PM

Longfield wrote:

The polititions care more about Stamp Duty (give money back to the rich by taxing the poor) than they do about people that care for us, says it all for Irish society

you clearly have not read the actual stamp duty proposals from the different parties have you???? read them and then tell me EXACTLY how it is giving money back to the rich by taxing the poor.......seriously....read them

Supercell · 07-04-2007 10:35PM

PeakOutput wrote:

yep it will be them and we appreciate it.....but its no excuse to bring the system to its knees coz they feel like throwing a tantrum

You know I was going to refute your "points" one by one, until I got to the above.

The Nurses are not throwing a "tantrum" - you clearly have a political agenda and are towing some kind of party line, thus debate is a moot point.

Supercell · 07-04-2007 10:37PM

PeakOutput wrote:

you clearly have not read the actual stamp duty proposals from the different parties have you???? read them and then tell me EXACTLY how it is giving money back to the rich by taxing the poor.......seriously....read them

As to StampDuty - go read posts on http://www.thepropertypin.com/forum/ or http://forum.globalhousepricecrash.com/index.php?&showforum=16

K-9 · 07-04-2007 10:38PM

PeakOutput wrote:

all ill say is that changing the government is the best that cn come out of it if the lose 40K votes but it still wont get the nurses what they want.........the next government wont give them it either...COZ IT MAKES NO ECONOMIC SENSE

I see FG on the news saying Bertie and Mary Harney should intervene. No, they shouldn't. Theres enough vested interests in it already.

They are chatting about reforming public sector pay and waste. If they get in they can be prepared for more Work stoppages/Strikes.

PeakOutput · 07-04-2007 10:40PM

Longfield wrote:

You know I was going to refute your "points" one by one, until I got to the above.

The Nurses are not throwing a "tantrum" - you clearly have a political agenda and are towing some kind of party line, thus debate is a moot point.

have you read the entire thread?? you will see as a completely impartial 21 year old with no affiliations to any political party i have no agenda and have pointed out that regardless of how i feel on the subject the way it looks on the outside is that they are throwing a tantrum because the labour court and benchmarking wont give them what they want.

PeakOutput · 07-04-2007 10:43PM

Longfield wrote:

As to StampDuty - go read posts on http://www.thepropertypin.com/forum/ or http://forum.globalhousepricecrash.com/index.php?&showforum=16

the first link is giving me a php error and the second is just a forum on property prices in ireland.........any particular thread i should read????

sorry for off topic

Supercell · 07-04-2007 10:53PM

PeakOutput wrote:

the first link is giving me a php error and the second is just a forum on property prices in ireland.........any particular thread i should read????

sorry for off topic

Wish the Pin one was working, Open Window the admin there seems to have the worst web host on earth, the site is often down, but the posts there are good when the darn site works!

There's a whole Stamp Duty myth tread going on there that could make sober reading for many.
The second one, read any of em, they all are equally dire.

If your 21 PO, jesus stamp duty shouldnt be on yer radar at all!!, in about 5 years when you should be starting to think about saving, Ireland's bubble should be well and truely burst, and hard working nurses should be able to afford a place to live close to work !!

AdMMM · 07-04-2007 10:57PM

While I understand the Nurses' frustration, I do feel that ultimately using patients as bargaining chips is taking it a step too far and in my mind is bordering on the line of negligence. By refusing to use systems that have been designed to make their jobs easier, they are only ensuring that overall patient care will fall. It digusts me to tell you the truth.

Threatening to vote against FF and the PDs is also an unprofessional stance to be taking and this act of pre-election desperation does nothing to win over any of my sympathy whatsoever.

PeakOutput · 07-04-2007 10:57PM

Longfield wrote:

Wish the Pin one was working, Open Window the admin there seems to have the worst web host on earth, the site is often down, but the posts there are good when the darn site works!

There's a whole Stamp Duty myth tread going on there that could make sober reading for many.
The second one, read any of em, they all are equally dire.

If your 21 PO, jesus stamp duty shouldnt be on yer radar at all!!, in about 5 years when you should be starting to think about saving, Ireland's bubble should be well and truely burst, and hard working nurses should be able to afford a place to live close to work !!

i work in an are awhere i can only get newstalk 106 on my headphones so i hear all the government blagging

i just dont see how geting rid of stamp duty on the first 100k and a much reduced rate on the next amount is giving money to the rich...........anyway ill read up more about it and start a thread dedicated to it if theres something fishy going on.......

synopsis of my previous replies in this thread as you must of missed them..........nurses = pay rise, nurses=/=shorter week (by a long shot at this moment and time)

K-9 · 07-04-2007 11:02PM

Longfield wrote:

If your 21 PO, jesus stamp duty shouldnt be on yer radar at all!!, in about 5 years when you should be starting to think about saving, Ireland's bubble should be well and truely burst, and hard working nurses should be able to afford a place to live close to work !!

Stamp duty shouldn't be on this radar/thread either:)

Either should scaremongering;)

As PeakOutPut says Nurses have rejected the Labour Court recommendations.

I'm very sceptical when either employers or Unions/Workers reject the Labour Court. They are people more qualified/researched on the subjects involved than most people on this thread.

Supercell · 07-04-2007 11:13PM

PeakOutput wrote:

i just dont see how geting rid of stamp duty on the first 100k and a much reduced rate on the next amount is giving money to the rich.

FTB'rs used to make up over 60 percent of the market, now thats down to the 30's.

The percentage of FTB buying properties that below the stamp duty threshold is somewhere near 80%.

The simple fact is that houses are too expensive for most FTB, and when stamp duty levels were raised last time to 317 the prices rose exactly to that level. However Income didnt jump accordingly and the sellers now think the magic fix is to make that threshold even higher, they don't seem to grasp that the problem for most peoples is not the duty but the price.

Anyhow, any people that are rich enough to be happy to pay the extra tax free price will do so at the expense of the tax payer. How will the government make up the tax shortfall ??, extra tax on alcohol, petrol , vat, etc etc, lowest earners will pay the highest earners stamp duty, reverse Robin Hood, Robbing the Poor to pay the Rich - Robbing Hood.

K-9 · 07-04-2007 11:21PM

http://www.rte.ie/news/2007/0320/cork.html

Link on Cork Maternity hospital Labour Court recommendations

http://www.hse.ie/text/en/NewsEvents/News/Archive/2006Archive/November2006/title,4160,en.html

Link on HSE accepting Labour Court recommendations.

I include these because they do show the HSE has acted on Labour Court recommendations and there not just the big bad wolf;)

K-9 · 07-04-2007 11:26PM

Longfield wrote:

The simple fact is that houses are too expensive for most FTB, and when stamp duty levels were raised last time to 317 the prices rose exactly to that level. However Income didnt jump accordingly and the sellers now think the magic fix is to make that threshold even higher, they don't seem to grasp that the problem for most peoples is not the duty but the price.

Still off topic, but seeing as you raise it:

Why do you think Cowen didn't adjust SD in last budget despite opposition / media uproar?

When the FTB limits are changed now, Developers will not put the price up accordingly, not with the market going back to normality and no more 15/20% increases a year. FTB will actually get the benefit now when they are increased.

SimpleSam06 · 08-04-2007 07:54AM

nurse_baz wrote:

Last I checked we lived in a Democracy, since when was it a bad/wrong thing to look to better your conditions? You were around 8 years ago??? When the IT sector was filled with money.....and IT contractors charged the equivalent of Somalia's national debt to do a bit of programming......wasn't so wrong then was it?

Hahaha, thats great. You, my friend, are a stereotype.

From the article:

During the dot-com period of temporary insanity, teachers and other public servants bought into the self-serving delusion that stories on the small number in the private sector like Fran Rooney who hit the jackpot with the Baltimore Technologies floatation, were representative of private sector workers, rolling in manna from heaven, while the brethren in the public sector had to survive on thin gruel.

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is not one for sailing against the wind and he agreed to the demands of public sector trade unions to set up a "benchmarking" body that was tasked with making comparisons between similar grades in the public and private sectors.

In the nod and wink world of Irish politics, the conclusions were agreed before the body was established and such minor issues as the gold plated pensions that were available to Bertie Ahern and others on the public payroll, compared with the zero coverage available to a large number of private sector workers, was conveniently ignored.

Baby, they got your number. Also I might point out that there is a major difference between a market that pays a high price willingly, and a nation being blackmailed by blinkered and pampered pseudo-academics out of some deluded sense of entitlement. Do read the rest of the article for more damning information.

nurse_baz wrote:

for someone that has obviously gotten some life experience......this is also a terribly lazy argument. How would feel the next time you go to hospital, there are no nurses to look after you? Because we al upped and left....

You all did that before. You may have forgotten the eighties. We'll just import nurses from Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia and India.

Again.

nurse_baz wrote:

my salary and that of most nurses working within the health care system is much much less than this. Approx 20k less in a lot of cases. Are you aware how theses figure were arrived at?

I know a good many nurses, and I respect them and their profession, if not their position, and I don't know one full time nurse that is earning less than 45k a year, plus very, very acceptable pension conditions.

nesf · 08-04-2007 11:44AM

SimpleSam06 wrote:

I know a good many nurses, and I respect them and their profession, if not their position, and I don't know one full time nurse that is earning less than 45k a year, plus very, very acceptable pension conditions.

And nearly all of them have specialised? I've a friend my age who's on 42K a year but she specialised in burns, I think what nurse_baz is talking about when he talks about 30Kish wages is general nurses who haven't specialised.

nesf · 08-04-2007 11:46AM

Longfield wrote:

FTB'rs used to make up over 60 percent of the market, now thats down to the 30's.

The percentage of FTB buying properties that below the stamp duty threshold is somewhere near 80%.

The simple fact is that houses are too expensive for most FTB, and when stamp duty levels were raised last time to 317 the prices rose exactly to that level. However Income didnt jump accordingly and the sellers now think the magic fix is to make that threshold even higher, they don't seem to grasp that the problem for most peoples is not the duty but the price.

Anyhow, any people that are rich enough to be happy to pay the extra tax free price will do so at the expense of the tax payer. How will the government make up the tax shortfall ??, extra tax on alcohol, petrol , vat, etc etc, lowest earners will pay the highest earners stamp duty, reverse Robin Hood, Robbing the Poor to pay the Rich - Robbing Hood.

Property market discussions are off-topic for this forum never mind this thread.

Laslo · 08-04-2007 11:57AM

nurse_baz wrote:

If said software enginerr had been able to pull himself/herself away from what ever important task they were up to ( reaching level 87 million on World of Warcraft.......designing a new schoolgirl avatar for some pseudo-online life simulator)

Well as far as I'm concerned, all you do is walk around in your sexy little nurses outfit, teasing sick old men and shagging doctors. But hey, that would be a gross generalisation too, wouldn't it?

So you want the people of this country to sympathise with your cause, yet you belittle other professions. Good luck, sweetheart!

If even once you conceded that *maybe* you *might* be a little bit wrong on this thread, even on one small matter, I might take you seriously. But you're on here debating to get what you want - agreeing with everyone who tells you what you want to hear, and criticising (and insulting) people who disagree with you.

Like I said, get back to work.

SimpleSam06 · 08-04-2007 01:19PM

nesf wrote:

And nearly all of them have specialised? I've a friend my age who's on 42K a year but she specialised in burns, I think what nurse_baz is talking about when he talks about 30Kish wages is general nurses who haven't specialised.

The starting pay for a graduate nurse straight out of college is €31,233, which is just about the average national industrial wage in the private sector.

The average wage of a public sector nurse was over €55,000 as of 2005, if you take into account benefits and overtime. The average pay for a nurse in the UK is around €36,000 per annum.

nesf · 08-04-2007 01:42PM

SimpleSam06 wrote:

The starting pay for a graduate nurse straight out of college is €31,233, which is just about the average national industrial wage in the private sector.

The average wage of a public sector nurse was over €55,000 as of 2005, if you take into account benefits and overtime. The average pay for a nurse in the UK is around €36,000 per annum.

Ah, I thought you meant basic. Point taken.

FlutterinBantam · 08-04-2007 02:05PM

After listening to News at One I am more convinced than ever that all this nurses unrest is orchestrated by INO leadership as an opportunistic attemt to make a name for themselves.

Doran hasn't been seen or heard of for the last few days,whereas before, turn on the radio and he was dishing out the rhetoric 24/7

jimmycrackcorm · 08-04-2007 02:50PM

Laslo wrote:

Haha. No. No it doesn't. You really are unbelievable! You've sat on this thread for 14 pages and pretty much contested every single assertion that didn't work in your favour and you've been blowing smoke up the arse of everyone that agrees with you. Absolutely pathetic.

You knew damn well what the pay was like when you accepted the job and you knew damn well what was involved in the job. If you didn't, you're stupid.

The average salary for nurses is between 50k and 55k - well above the national average. You earn more than enough already.

As for working less hours? Suck it up. I'm a software developer with 8 years experience, I work probably 50 hours a week, don't get paid any overtime and I earn 10k-15k less than the average nurse. Stop your bloody moaning and get back to work.

My wife is a nurse with 8 years experience and earns 28k a year. The only benefit is that she get to work flexible hours. To get 50k she would probably have to have 25 years experience and work in a specialised area.

I just read that Harney is proposing doing away with the flexible work practices (http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS-qqqs=news-qqqid=22569-qqqx=1.asp). A sure vote-winner there.

ronbyrne2005 · 08-04-2007 04:15PM

No they shouldnt get what they effectively want which is 32% raise for little or no improvement/ efficiency improvements. Why are'nt they out protesting about the problems in A&E and offering solutions to fix it? They have been building to this industrial action for last few years now and have been using media to exaggerate the problems in health system(they do exist but once you get into hospital things are prety good) with their "trolleywatch" daily count of people on trolleys and their short pickets outside hospitals with patients groups calling for more this and better that.

They already start on a basic of 32k sraight out of college and get paid when training as part of their degree. Vast majority of grads would kill for such salary and the great pension all state employees get. Factor in a little overtime and shift allowances etc and a nurse straight out of college can earn 38k plus great pension.

They claim to be less well paid/treated than other health professionals but they are less qualified than pysiotherapists who hey claim to be equal to!

Huge numbers apply for the places in nursing degrees in colleges through the CAO each year demonstrating the attractiveness of the profession to young people doing their leaving cert.

Nurses leave the Irish health service for many reasons unrelated to pay and conditions. Most that leave would return at some stage after travelling/living abroad for several years. Why do nurses flock here from all over the world if its sooo bad?

They are already among best paid nurses in Europe.

If they get what they are demanding then the rest of the public sector will want the same and the huge bill for all these things will be footed by the taxpayer and mainly those in private sector who cant extort large pay rises and great pensions from their employers through union power,political threats and militantcy.

Nurses do a great job but when is enough enough? Nurses seem to feel as they do a degree (which may not even be necessary for many) that they are entitled to a status above their actual position in the health service.

http://www.unison.ie/business/stories.php3?ca=80&si=1809093
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqs=news-qqqid=22551-qqqx=1.asp

A Random Walk · 08-04-2007 06:36PM

It's fairly clear to me from reading this thread, listening to the phone ins, reading the opinions in papers and talking to friends that the nurses have completely lost the battle for public support and won't get what they're looking for. The question now is how long this action will continue and how much further damage are they willing to do to the image of nursing in this country.

K-9 · 09-04-2007 01:11AM

jimmycrackcorm wrote:

My wife is a nurse with 8 years experience and earns 28k a year. The only benefit is that she get to work flexible hours. To get 50k she would probably have to have 25 years experience and work in a specialised area.

I just read that Harney is proposing doing away with the flexible work practices (http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS-qqqs=news-qqqid=22569-qqqx=1.asp). A sure vote-winner there.

Why is she earning 28K. I know Nurses who earn €30,500 after 2 years working with no degree. There must be some reason she is on less than the €32K starting salary.

Also from the Post:
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqm=nav-qqqid=22551-qqqx=1.asp

K-9 · 09-04-2007 01:14AM

A Random Walk wrote:

It's fairly clear to me from reading this thread, listening to the phone ins, reading the opinions in papers and talking to friends that the nurses have completely lost the battle for public support and won't get what they're looking for. The question now is how long this action will continue and how much further damage are they willing to do to the image of nursing in this country.

The teachers never recovered from their strikes either. I think the INO have seriously miscalculated their strategy. Public opinion in the majority will go against them.

Improving A&E's, waiting lists etc. etc. is of more importance to the Public than nurses wage demands.

nesf · 09-04-2007 02:41AM

Hmm, work stoppages plans announced: http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/frontpage/2007/0409/1175721063827.html

Bob the Builder · 09-04-2007 02:53AM

Seanies32 wrote:

.....Improving A&E's, waiting lists etc. etc. is of more importance to the Public than nurses wage demands.

Well, if they stopped spending millions of euro on stupid budgets and emplying people through political Pull as management of the HSE, it would sort out a lot of the problems with HSE and the like.

An example you ask? 150million euros down the drain on a PPARS system that never happened.

Or maybe how a staff nurse with 9months nursing experience can become a Director of Nursing in a nursing home with little more qualifications of a driving licence and absoloutley no management skills what-so-ever, and beat(by 1%) a Clinical Nursing Manager with all management courses completed, and 27years experience.

Could you imagine how much better off we would all be if they got rid of all those major glitches in the HSE, if they straightened the HSE and the hospitals out once and for all, they could easily save up to €2billion a year easily, and stop making crap decisions by un-qualified "professionals", they could easily afford to pay nurses for what the nurses deserve, and still have money to straighten out the A&E and all those other problems.

Let no-one come here and say that nurses are the criminals, they're just the victims working harsh hours and under faulty management, and it's them bastards in Fianna Fail and the HSE that are promoting the nurses as being bad people when they flaunder money to all their political pull homies that they have scattered across the HSE in all the regions.

ellenmelon · 09-04-2007 04:55AM

what always really upset my mum, was the fact that my boyfriend who was a run of the mill post man for an post, earnt more than she did. thats really f*cked up in my opinion. and she had been working as a nurse (mostly in paed onc. until recently) for 25 years

the last year she was working in ireland, she was doing night shifts as they pay better, and they usually work week on, week off. she had do go do agency work in dublin to make ends meet. instead of having a break for a week, she had no choice but to go make enough to pay the rent, pay off her student loan, pay the electricity etc etc
working conditions at her hospital were absolutely shocking..having to re-clean after people paid bloody good money to clean hospitals left bathrooms half clean. in good conscience she just couldnt leave them like that. have you ever noticed that a lot of hospitals in ireland dont smell like they should? there should be a constant smell of cleaning products and disenfectant. it smells rank but at least you know the place is clean!!
working under unexperienced nurse managers (who were often up to 15 years younger than her..) who were so patronising and condescending my mum was so wound up by the end of her shift.
(when she began working as a trainee midwife)being abused by the family of women who were having babies when they were asked to leave so the woman could be treated or even just because the visiting hours are over.
in dublin, she was working with foreign nurses who were nothing but glorified nurse aids (all respect to those nurse aids out there..they have a hard time too) that spoke very little english and had to be watched constantly for fear of them doing something wrong. were any of the actually trained midwives paid any extra for this supervisory work? not a chance.
and unfortunately, there are still doctors out there also that treat nurses like they are stupid when they would be lost without them.

all they want is to be paid for the hard work that they do. they've been doing the best with what theyve been given for too long and i dont blame them for wanting some recompense for the sh!t they have to deal with. you whinge about it now, but you would be whinging more when you're (heaven forbid) in hospital being looked after by harried, underpaid nurses.

The Nurses.

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