Several boxes of brilliant-purple strike pamphlets were confiscated this week so North Shore district nurses couldn’t share them with curious patients while on a uniform strike.
More than 60 Waitematā district nurses this month voted to go on uniform strike to highlight staff shortages, cancellations and delays in their service across west Auckland’s Waitākere, North Shore, Wellsford and Hibiscus Coast.
‘We’re actually standing up for our patients doing this. But we feel like the Government or our management is trying to put a gag on us to not talk about it.’
NZNO delegate and district nurse Lesley Ward said staff were warned by Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand (HNZ) Waitematā management not to distribute the pamphlets, which explain why staff were wearing colourful T-shirts and scrubs instead of uniforms.
They outline the staffing problems, recruitment freeze and invite patients to contact NZNO or raise the issue with their local MP.
But after being delivered to the North Shore, before nurses could take them out on the road, the boxes were confiscated, she said.
“We got an email to say we weren’t allowed to do that, that we were putting patients in a very vulnerable position talking to them about this stuff,” Ward told Kaitiaki.
“I thought ‘that’s pretty ironic, considering patients are already so vulnerable because we are so short-staffed’. It’s just rude — really rude.”
Staff were “pretty angry and upset,” she said. “We feel like management is trying to gag us.”
Ward said management had previously tried to stop the strike from going ahead, claiming life-preserving services were needed — a claim which was rejected after an adjudication hui — and by members.
‘It’s like playground stuff: ‘I’m going to take your crayons because you’re not doing what I want’.’
The opposite was true, she said. HNZ was failing in its duty of care to patients, and nurses were calling them out on it.
“We’re actually standing up for our patients doing this. But we feel like the Government or our management is trying to put a gag on us to not talk about it.”
Banning ‘backfired’
However, the move had backfired, as staff were “way more fired up” now.
“It’s hilarious — especially with them going missing. It’s like playground stuff: ‘I’m going to take your crayons because you’re not doing what I want’.”
In Taranaki, where similar visibility strikes are underway, delegate Glenda Huston said management were also making life hard, banning posters on walls, windows or lifts.
“They’ve been saying it’s an infection control risk because anything [unlaminated] on the walls is part of the cleaning schedule,” she said. “They can put posters up — but we can’t.”
Huston said it felt heavy-handed and a way of “gagging” staff.
“It’s encroaching on our right to strike, is what it is.”
However, patients were “very” supportive and curious about what staff were wearing, she said.
Similar NZNO strikes are also underway in Whangārei and Canterbury,
HNZ members around the country have also reported being ordered to remove safe staffing stickers as health and safety risk — and even threatened with Nursing Council referrals.
NZNO chief executive Paul Goulter said today that taking part in strikes to support collective bargaining was members’ legal right — and NZNO would support any member bullied for taking part in lawful strike action.
“We have zero tolerance for any employer going after our members in this manner.”
NZNO-HNZ bargaining has been dragging on for 18 months, with several sticking points around enforceable staff staffing, culturally-safe patient ratios, designated senior nurses’ pay rates and full graduate employment.
