Nurses and midwives in New South Wales have rejected the state government’s insulting offer of a 3 percent pay rise in a combative, all-membership meeting at Sydney’s Town Hall.
Members of the New South Wales Nurses and Midwives’ Association (NSWNMA) will strike tomorrow, less than two months since our first state-wide strike in a decade. Most of the more than 160 branches that voted to strike have pledged to walk out for 24 hours, an escalation from February’s strike, when only a few hospitals committed to a whole-day action.
Members of the New South Wales Nurses and Midwives’ Association at Westmead Hospital protested last Wednesday to demand that the Perrottet government address the crisis in the state’s hospitals.
We’re being told that we have to live with the virus. But the people telling us this are doing, and have done, next to nothing to prepare our health system for the consequences.
The coronavirus outbreak tearing through Sydney and now regional New South Wales is testing the public healthcare system like nothing before it. Yesterday, the Australian Medical Association said that the public health system can’t manage the increasing caseloads.