Nurses demonstrate outside St Thomas’ Hospital, London, Thursday December 15, 2022. KIN CHEUNG / AP
First strike in thirty years for English and Welsh paramedics this Wednesday 21st December, historic strike by English nurses the day before, Scottish nurses poised to strike in turn in early 2023, not to mention young doctors still due Work stoppages to be consulted after celebrations…
Exhausted by the pandemic and years of underinvestment in public hospitals, UK healthcare workers are demanding significant wage increases and poised for a harsh and protracted social conflict. Rishi Sunak’s conservative government remains deaf to this unprecedented mobilization of staff who are not normally very assertive.
Tuesday 20th December, London Bridge, south side of the River Thames. At the foot of St Thomas’ Hospital, one of the largest healthcare facilities in London, a hundred nurses, members of the main professional union, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), hold a very lively picket line. This is the first time the RCN has called a strike in 106 years. Strangers stop to chat. Double-decker buses and taxis honk past in solidarity.
“An unbelievable lack of respect”
“I love my job, but it’s getting harder and harder. I’ve been working during the pandemic, I’ve been assigned to a Covid unit, in ICU, but it’s been tough,” says Jack, 30, head nurse at St Thomas for a year – most of the strikers refuse to give their last name. “During the confinement that members of the government were celebrating, they showed us an incredible lack of respect. And now they’re telling us they can’t raise us? ‘ the young man chokes, referring to ‘Partygate’, the scandal of parties organized in Downing Street during the period of restrictions related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The RCN union is demanding a 19% wage increase to offset inflation above 10% % and a decade of wage stagnation. The government doesn’t want to hear about it, taking refuge behind the conclusions of the Pay Review Body, an advisory body which last July recommended an increase of around 4% for health workers in the National Health Service (NHS) .
“We can’t take it anymore. It’s not just the pay, it’s the way we’re treated or the expectations of the hospitals” – Eddie Brand, Paramedic
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