Registered nurses working in private nursing homes are being paid less than if they were packing bags in supermarkets, and they are being intimidated by owners from "the Ryanair school of management", a nurses' conference was told yesterday.
Delegates at the Irish Nurses' Organisation annual conference were told these nurses were being paid significantly less than the minimum wage. "We must take on these nursing-home owners", the INO assistant general secretary, Ms Lenore Mrkwicka, told delegates.
Those working in Co Wexford nursing homes fared among the worst, she explained, being paid £2.75 an hour. She said it was unacceptable and intolerable.
The union had attempted to negotiate on behalf of these nurses with the Irish Home Association, but had had little or no success, she said. "I have got it in writing from the association that these nurses should bring it up locally themselves. But in that event they are faced with intimidation at the very least."
She called on nurses working in these homes to trust the INO to take the employers to the Labour Court because they were breaking labour laws.
"They are not paying medical staff below the going rate, so why not pay the nursing staff properly?" The worst offenders were not just small nursing homes, she said.
Meanwhile in his address the Minister for Health, Mr Cowen, warned nurses that the Commission on Nursing would not provide instant solutions to problems.
He said it would not be possible for the Commission, which is due to report in July, to implement in a single step the overall policy on nursing" that will be developed around its recommendations.
Earlier, however, a motion was passed unanimously that if the Commission did not address all the needs of the nursing profession, "speedy reactivation of the deferred industrial action would commence".
The INO general secretary, Mr P.J. Madden, warned that nurses had simply deferred their threatened industrial action last year.
"Let nobody say the INO has forgotten the very large, unfinished agenda," said Mr Madden.
Mr Cowen told the nurses that he felt he should be quite upfront with them. "I cannot provide you with instant solutions to all the problems facing nurses, but I can give you a commitment that I will work with you in a structured fashion over a period of time," he said.
In her address the INO president, Ms Ann Coady, said the union expected recommendations from the Commission dealing with matters such as continuing professional development and education as a right, appropriate advancement opportunities, recognition of the status and responsibilities of the pivotal promotional grade of ward sister and recognition of the role of specialist nurses "to name but a few of our major concerns".
Delegates also voted to reintroduce a nationwide ban on nurses filling in for superiors at management level at weekends.
They rejected a Labour Court payment recommendation as "completely inadequate". The ban is to remain in place until "a satisfactory and acceptable compensatory package has been introduced."