INL 15 Jan 2019 Digital Edition

JANUARY 15, 2019
Junior Hospital doctors to strike today
Katie Scotcher
RNZ Wellington
Homelink
05
Junior hospital doctors
will strike in two weeks
in a bid to get better
employment protection.
They will walk off the job
for 48 hours from today
(January 15, 2019).
The Resident Doctors’
Association said that they
wanted a renewed collective
employment agreement as
theirs expired nearly a year
ago.
Outstanding issues
Association President Dr
Courtney Brown said that
after a year of bargaining
with District Health Boards
(DHBs), significant claw backs
to their terms and conditions
remained on the table.
Junior Doctors say that they
want a fair deal (Image
from RDA Video)
Doctors move between
DHBs and hence, without a
collective agreement, they
were at the mercy of different
arrangements, Dr Brown
said.
National secretary Deborah
Powell said that there are a
number of issues in the proposed
agreement that would
impact where and how junior
doctors work.
“The employers want
the right to send us to any
hospital or any DHB in the
country. Currently we move
Dr Ralston D’Souza (from RDA Video)
around a lot, but it is by
agreement - they want to take
that agreement provision out
of the collective.
Families affected
“The impact on that to
residents as far as their
personal lives are concerned,
their families is huge,” Dr
Powell said.
It is unlikely that the
strike will be called off and a
settlement will be reached in
time, Dr Powell said.
“The employers have been
incredibly bullish at the
table... no one else in health is
facing claw backs, everyone
else is getting improvement
in terms and conditions at
the moment, so they have
really singled out the resident
doctors in this dispute,” Dr
Powell said.
All DHBs, excluding West
Coast District Health Board,
will be affected by the strike.
DHBs disappointed
DHB spokesperson Peter
Bramley said the boards are
disappointed some trainee
doctors had chosen to strike
instead of helping to address
issues of staffing numbers,
work hours and fatigue.
“The action is regrettable as
DHBs have made a good offer
that builds on past negotiations
to deal with stress and
fatigue,” Dr Bramley said.
He said that a new system
for organising work was
agreed in the last RMO
(Resident Medical Officers)
pay talks - it has been implemented
in more than half of
all applicable rosters.
It has addressed some RMO
concerns about work hours,
but other issues have been
identified, he said.
“We are not interested
in clawing back conditions
as suggested but rather are
looking for options that allow
greater local flexibility in
work patterns that support
better training and improved
clinical care,” Dr Bramley said.
Contingency planning to
ensure emergency and essential
services are available to
those who need them is well
underway, Dr Bramley added.
Katie Scotcher is a Reporter
at Radio New Zealand. Indian
Newslink has published
the above story under a
Special Agreement with
www.rnz.co.nz
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