Upper North Island nurses threaten strike action

11.45am

About 5000 nurses in the upper North Island are threatening to walk off the job in six weeks after the breakdown of their pay talks.

The nurses are trying to negotiate a multi-employer collective agreement for better pay and conditions.

If industrial action went ahead, services at nine hospitals would be disrupted.

Nurses working in the community, such as public health and district health nurses, would also join their colleagues in strike action.

Talks have broken down because five district health boards -- Northland, Waikato, Tairawhiti, Lakes and Bay of Plenty -- are refusing to include about 200 nurse managers in the agreement.

The nurses' union, the Nurses Organisation, plans to ballot its members on industrial action in a series of meetings over the next few weeks.

Shane Vugler, a union organiser representing Lakeland Health nurses, said the boards' decision had left nurses with very few options.

"We want to progress with talks but the boards aren't budging. That means nurses must put pressure on their employers to return to the bargaining table and industrial action is one way we can do that," he said.

The boards want a separate agreement for nurse managers as they claim their issues, roles and responsibilities are separate from other nurses.

The nurses' union believes that under the Employment Relations Act, boards don't have the right to make that decision.

The union and the Public Service Association have been negotiating with boards for four months over better pay for nurses, unified career structures and safer staffing levels.

The union is hoping the new agreement will solve the issue of recruitment and retention of nurses.

They will report back to members in meetings to be held over the next six weeks and discuss what further action they should take. The union must give boards at least 14 days' notice of any strike.

A spokesman for upper North Island boards, Ron Dunham, said the boards were surprised and disappointed by the union's stance as separate agreements for nurse managers had already been successfully concluded in Auckland and the lower North Island.

Mr Dunham said a separate document for nursing management positions would enable them to retain a group identity with an agreement that focused on their particular employment issues rather than general nursing concerns.

The boards had guaranteed that no nurse would be disadvantaged in any separate agreement for nurse managers.

Pay demands have been kept under wraps during negotiations but Mr Dunham said the boards and the union had been making good progress on a number of issues, including pay, when talks broke down.

- DAILY POST (ROTORUA)