'They don't feel valued': Sinn Féin to table Dáil motion on fair pay for student nurses

A review ordered by the Department of Health's Professor Tom Collins recommended that student nurses be paid €100 a week on placement, which was rejected by the nurses and unions.

Sinn Féin spokesperson on Health David Cullinane says he has engaged with hundreds of student nurses and midwives over the last number of months, and heard the experiences of student nurses on boards working in the healthcare system.

It is not lost on Student Nurses & Midwives that while they were offered a pathetic €100 a week during a pandemic & no permanent solution that 3 Government Ministers met & signed off on an €81,000 pay increase for a new permanent Secretary General in Health. @sinnfeinireland

— David Cullinane T.D. (@davidcullinane) January 18, 2021

"They are not having their hands held by anybody," he said.

"They are doing really valuable work in the healthcare system, and what they have been justly demanding now for a long time, is a fair wage in terms of fourth-year interns and a fair allowance for those first to third years. 

"That hasn't happened, it hasn't been put in place, and the government commissioned their review and already we can see from the reaction from the Irish nurses and midwives organisation and from SIPTU whose Health Division and others that they rightly feel, and I have to say I feel myself, that the report itself is now obsolete.

Things have dramatically changed even since the publication of the report, what's happening in the hospitals obviously at the moment is quite serious with the numbers of hospitalizations, ICU, almost at full capacity.

"So, it should be all hands on deck.

"I know many student nurses are very upset as well with the decision that was taken to pull the placements of 2000 student nurses and midwives for a number of weeks.

"They feel that's unfair, and there is no certainty or clarity been offered to them in relation to when those placements will happen.

"There has been no engagement, it was a unilateral decision made, and essentially, I see this as an issue with fairness, that if we really want those student nurses and midwives to take up jobs in the Irish healthcare system then we need to make sure that they are valued, and they are treated fairly.

But they don't feel valued and they don't feel that they are being treated fairly.

Sinn Féin's motion is calling on the Government to refer to the agreement in place in the past, to ensure that if those who are on placements who want a HCA (Healthcare assistant) contract are offered it.

They also want fourth-year interns that are currently working to have their payment go up to a HCA rate, and that there is a long-term solution for a paid allowance system for student nurses and midwives.

"I don't believe that €100 is anywhere near a fair allowance, as is always the case, there has to be negotiation between the representative of groups and the government themselves," Mr Cullinane added.

"So when we call for consistency, it is that the Government and the minister would sit down with the INMO and then work out a fair amount and it's not for me to put a figure on that because obviously that is something that would have to be negotiated.

"But I think any reasonable person, when they look at a work that is done by students nurses and midwives, €100 a week is anywhere near fair."