Harney says dispute unfair to patients

Dail Report:The nurses' dispute was unfair to patients, Minister for Health Mary Harney told the Dáil. She said fairness demanded that disputes were fully explored and settled without distress to patients.

"There is no point arguing in theory over what kind of industrial action affects patients and their families. The test is a simple one: what do patients and their families actually experience? What do they say?

"And on that basis, I think it is clear already. I deeply regret to say it, but the present industrial action is simply not fair to patients, even before any escalation."

Fairness demanded that account be taken of 300,000 other public sector workers who had agreed to a fair and collective way to address their pay concerns through benchmarking and Towards 2016, said Ms Harney.

Fairness also demanded that account be taken of 1.7 million private sector workers, for many of whom pay and conditions were also set or influenced through partnership, and whose taxes paid for the salaries of the public sector. "These workers include nurses in the private sector, I should add." Ms Harney said fairness also demanded that account be taken of all taxpayers who together paid more than €14 billion for health services and investment this year and who rightly could ask the reasons why upwards of €1 billion more would be required from them to meet the demands in the dispute.

Earlier, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern said that both the Labour Court and the national implementation body had come to the view that the issues raised by the nurses could be dealt with through benchmarking.

A reduction to a 35-hour week would involve a reduction of 7.7 million nursing hours, he added.

Sinn Féin spokesman Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin claimed that the mantra of benchmarking had been much used and abused in the dispute.

"What benchmarking was there for the three top advisers to HSE chief executive Brendan Drumm, who between them were paid €1 million in just 15 months up to January this year? This included an overtime rate of up to €1,500 per day.

"One of these individuals contracted to advise Prof Drumm on primary care has now left the HSE to be a director of a private healthcare development company. The HSE would be better off employing more cleaning staff in all our hospitals and paying them more generously to help stamp out MRSA."

Labour spokeswoman Liz McManus said it was important to recognise that the issues at the centre of the dispute were not simply about additional money but also about the conditions that nurses worked in.

She added that more than 11,000 Irish-trained nurses had left the State since 1998. "We are increasingly dependent on nurses coming from overseas to fill the gap. The number of qualified nurses who take up employment in areas outside of nursing is considerable." Fine Gael health spokesman Dr Liam Twomey said he could not see anything that could not be resolved to some degree. "There must be a resolution to this dispute." Green Party spokesman John Gormley urged Ms Harney to look at the dispute in a very different way.

"The problem, and you know this, is that it will escalate and will have to be resolved at some stage," he said.

Joe Higgins (Socialist Party, Dublin West) said that because of its record on the health services, the Government did not have the moral authority to lecture nurses.

"Pay the nurses, Minister, and maybe cut back on some of the goodies you are throwing to your millionaire privileged friends at taxpayers' expense," he said.