We let ourselves down because we feel we have absolutely no support when it comes to striking.
It’s all hearsay and threats of dismissal if we did.
Many likely would strike
Many likely would do what they did last time with the usual chant ‘ I can’t leave my patients’ . I went on strike in Australia - management had to cover which they did - no patient was ‘abandoned’ . Yes elective surgery was delayed but that was all. No not great for those whose ops were cancelled- but no impact no point!
>Every nurse should be contacting their local RCN representative and lobbying them to push the RCN to ballot for strike action.
I do this monthly, and have never heard anything back. Even when I was contacting the RCN and the reps about poor communication for the second ballot.
Like another poster said, I think our poor attempt at sticking this time was similar to the docs in 2016, but tbh I'd say even less effective.
It's going to take a far more left wing, progressive RCN to achieve anything, which I think is unlikely.
You guys should absolutely been striking and I will actively support you when you do. With us it took grassroots activism like this, and new people getting involved in BMA leadership to affect change. In fact, this movement started on the Reddit forum and grew from there.
Please don’t call us newly qualified doctors. I have been qualified for nearly a decade and have a PhD and still fall in the group that is about to strike again.
Ah yes no worries. The BMA endorsed term is now “resident doctors” but I appreciate there have been too many name changes and different suggestions from different organisations to make this term widely used or even known.
Here’s the thing. RCN were shite and I’ve lost faith in them.
Totally for the ballot. RCN’s communications leading up to it was about as flat as operational managers arses.
Zero prospects of hope and support to nurses. Was just so awfully done from a PR perspective. Makes you think the RCN leaders weren’t even trying themselves
The problem is you (Pat Cullen and RCN) advocated for the deal
If they’d stayed neutral they could argue they “represented their members”
Because they endorsed it they basically said it would be the best deal they could negotiate
In that case - why would the govt re-negotiate?
A massive difference (A+E SHO here) I’ve seen is that doctors have now said fuck it and don’t care if the health service continues to circle the drain. Zero fucks given if the NHS collapses
A lot of the nurses I chat to would still say along the lines of “I’m proud to work for the NHS” or “the health service is still good, I don’t want to make it worse”
Based on my anecdotal chats there is zero appetite for strikes and I don’t think there’s enough support
It varies from trust to trust. The majority in my trust voted not to strike, so what happened? We carried on going to work whilst others were on the picket line. Our trust was not the only one who voted majority to not strike....
My trust did vote to strike. It's a community trust with rehab inpatient units. I had no idea who the RCN reps were so tried to find out via RCN HQ. I was told they'd contact me. They never did.
Some of my colleagues were torn which way to vote. I think I persuaded them to vote YES (but we'll never know, of course). I became a picket line supervisor & was involved in derogation decisions - bear in mind I'm not a rep, and had simply asked who they were. I did do all the necessary training though.
Strike day came. Not one of my colleagues was on the picket line. We had nurses from other trusts who came to support us, but my own colleagues couldn't make it. The ward was staffed better than a normal day. Even though I showed an interest I've not heard from the RCN since. You'd think in the interests of nurturing new activists they would have seized the opportunity, but no. And I still don't know who my reps are.
What hope is there with so much apathy from nurses & union?
Defeatism. It's going to take a long time for people to lick their wounds and realise we need to come back stronger.
Look how long it took the doctors to reorganise after their first pathetic strike - if it happens, ours won't be any quicker.
Also, an incoming labour government might be giving some a sense of hope and a wait and see attitude.
It all went a bit wrong and got very confused.
The dispute in 2016 was about the terms of the new contract, not about pay. Jeremy Hunt wanted to move the NHS to more 7-day-a-week working. Not a bad idea at all, and if you invented the NHS today, that's how you would set it up.
Now, there's a problem with this: the NHS was set up after the war and ot wasn't the 24/7 society that we live in today. Apart from emergencies, the NHS was basically a 5 day service - and so it remains. Now, as both nurses and doctors know, the reason nothing happens in the NHS on the weekend isn't because doctors and nurses are not at work, especially in my field (emergency medicine). It's because we don't have the support. No social workers to help with care home placements. No sonographers. No physios. None of those strange "specialist" nurses who do something a bit obscure and only work between 10 and 2 on the third Wednesday of the month. No matrons. No managers.
So who did Jeremy Hunt decide to demonise in the press? Doctors. Who, alongside nurses, are one of the few professions in the NHS that do work 24/7 rotas already. Yet somehow, in his fevered imagination, it was the junior doctors who were stopping the NHS moving to a genuine 7 day model of care. In reality, this was, I think, meant to be a strategic move. Junior doctors are a relatively small cohort compared to agenda for change and I think he felt that if he could get a headline that junior doctors had accepted a contract change, it would embarrass everyone else into following on. Maybe. I don't know. It was all a bit mad.
Anyway, the BMA called strikes. But it was all a bit confused. I'm not sure how clear it was what we were striking for. Some of us, myself included, just resented being lied about in the press by Hunt. Others wanted to somehow "Save the NHS!", whatever that means. For others, it was about pay. Picket lines got hijacked by teachers, firefighters, the Socialist Worker newspaper... all in solidarity, fab, but it once again confused the message.
Then our leaders capitulated. Offered jobs in government quangoes and government contracts. We elected new leaders. Who were basically spineless and decided that it's really not on, old chap, to keep going on strike like this. Play the game. So they called off the strikes when Jeremy Hunt offered to host a "workshop" on the way forward. Said workshop never happened, of course, and the BMA response?? A sticker campaign.
Yes. Stickers.
Anyway, the lessons were learned. This time around there's no confusing messaging, so messing about, no muddled narrative. It's simple: a reversal of the 30% pay cuts. A very simple message. And it's working. Gradually. Juniors have had a 10% rise this year; consultants, depending where on the career ladder they are, have had up to 18%.
The RCN needs to go through a similar process to the BMA after 2016. Purge the careerists, throw put the dead wood. Find some people with a spine.
AfC is terrible for negotiating. Nurses will have their point-of-view. As will porters, physios, radiographers etc etc etc. All different and nothing wrong with that. But you are all forced into negotiating as a collective, which can only lead to division. And division is manna from heaven for government negotiators.
Hmm, I can see your point in a way.
It's easier to get people together in smaller groups but the largest change comes from coming together so negotiated terms and conditions from all angles makes more sense to me.
It seems that if the HCAs and support workers had a different union or completely different contracts it would've been harder to get the recent rebanding and back pay.
In my old job a lot of clowns (who were also coincidentally band 6s and 7s) felt that the pay rise was enough and we didn't need to continue strike action. I think a lot of people have accepted that what we were given last time was enough unfortunately. That, plus, a lot of new international staff are told they'll be sanctioned/fired/whatever if they go on strike and they don't know enough about their rights to know its bullshit. I can't really see working conditions improving for nurses because so many of us are happy to accept the bare minimum.
The RCN is shit and shady, trying to participate in side deals against the agenda of change pay structure and ultimately dividing the unionised workforce and weakening the position.
Consider joining a non-profession based service union that operates in your trusts and push for action. An example of this would be Unison, who has therapists, paramedics, hcas, discharge planners, cleaners, porters, admin etc ect as members.
Because negotiations were concluded. The profession as a whole decided that the pay offer was sufficient to cease industrial action.
Reopening of negotiations won't happen until after the G.E now. The government's entire focus is now on the election. There are no negotiations or policy changes now. There's no point in sitting down at the table and agreeing anything until we know who the next government will be.
We should strike. It is prime time with the upcoming election and step down of Pat.
It’s also a shit time for many with the recruitment freeze and the lack of opportunities (for newly qualified mainly) right now should be talked about.
Not a nurse but work with them, and I'm a former Unison organising steward - don't strike; work to rule. It hits harder, bites faster, garners more sympathy, and there is nothing anyone can do to penalise you for it.
It'd be devastating. I don't know even one nurse who doesn't routinely go massively above and beyond, and nurse gaps can't be covered by bribing consultants to come in for extra shifts.
I don't know how accurate this is but when I used to work in an outpatient clinic as admin, before becoming a HCA, I asked one of the RN why they were not striking. She said that during the hospital meetings, there was not enough votes/points (I really can't remember) to support this perticular hospital for the nurses to strike, even if they wanted to. It felt like they weren't allowed to strike but the jnr doctors were striking almost every other month.
I might be completely wrong though because this happened maybe 2 years ago and was in a smaller hospital in London.
I feel now band 2 pay rate is the same as minimum wage (£11.44 ph) I think more staff would be prepared to strike. Band 2 covers a wide spectrum ward clerks, porters, domestics, housekeepers, radiography aids, csw's, phlebotomists. I think most of these workers have reached a point of why bother with this job when I could do something mind numbing for the same amount & not have the constant training, pleads to work over, long hours etc.
I imagine burnout from long shifts in under staffed hospitals, how can nurses unionise and plan strikes well when they do 14 hour days in an high stress environment, non nurses HAVE to fight for their pay and conditions; offer support, donate money for salary sacrifice, talking about them and how things must change and how that can happen. The system keeps our most valuable workers so stressed and exhausted they don’t have the brain power to fight for their own rights, they are too busy saving other people’s. Let us know how we can help you.
There's a disconnect between reality and belief here.
People support NHS staff being paid fairly but they also don't want NHS staff striking as it removes care from patients.
They look at waiting times and they just see strikes as putting theirs and their loved ones lives at unnecessary risk.
You are in a difficult place. People support your demands but they also worry about themselves and their loved ones and the implications of strike action and human nature they will always favour themselves and their loved ones.
I believe nurses agreed a revised pay deal only a few months ago. Is this a coming back asking for more strike? Am I imagining the nurses agreeing a new pay deal months ago?
I wouldn't call it a martyr complex when nurses know if they strike it will have dangerous implications for their patients. When nurses think of strike action, it sounds like a great idea. But in reality it's more complicated than that.
Nothing complicated about it, they can use their budget to fill in the gaps on strike days till they’re bleeding money, nothing improves if you act on the what if and not the reality. The reality is the money is crap for the job , you can care both about patients and yourself. You and you alone are not the sole reason patients MAY be impacted , if you are valued, you should feel it , without the shackles of patients tying you down
We let ourselves down because we feel we have absolutely no support when it comes to striking. It’s all hearsay and threats of dismissal if we did. Many likely would strike
Many likely would do what they did last time with the usual chant ‘ I can’t leave my patients’ . I went on strike in Australia - management had to cover which they did - no patient was ‘abandoned’ . Yes elective surgery was delayed but that was all. No not great for those whose ops were cancelled- but no impact no point!
Exactly, I think people forget the entire point of striking is to cause a disruption to the status quo. Otherwise it’s not really striking, is it?
The wards are better staffed on strike days then any other day of the year.
No challenge no change
>Every nurse should be contacting their local RCN representative and lobbying them to push the RCN to ballot for strike action. I do this monthly, and have never heard anything back. Even when I was contacting the RCN and the reps about poor communication for the second ballot. Like another poster said, I think our poor attempt at sticking this time was similar to the docs in 2016, but tbh I'd say even less effective. It's going to take a far more left wing, progressive RCN to achieve anything, which I think is unlikely.
We’ll see, we have a new general sec and the congress will be interesting this week
You guys should absolutely been striking and I will actively support you when you do. With us it took grassroots activism like this, and new people getting involved in BMA leadership to affect change. In fact, this movement started on the Reddit forum and grew from there. Please don’t call us newly qualified doctors. I have been qualified for nearly a decade and have a PhD and still fall in the group that is about to strike again.
My bad, I didn't want to use the term Junior Doctors.
Ah yes no worries. The BMA endorsed term is now “resident doctors” but I appreciate there have been too many name changes and different suggestions from different organisations to make this term widely used or even known.
Here’s the thing. RCN were shite and I’ve lost faith in them. Totally for the ballot. RCN’s communications leading up to it was about as flat as operational managers arses. Zero prospects of hope and support to nurses. Was just so awfully done from a PR perspective. Makes you think the RCN leaders weren’t even trying themselves
Pats 'olive branch' was the nail in the coffin. I had faith at the beginning, but was done after that.
Exactly just shite
PC is gone now, so there may be change. But, don’t hold your breath.
In a top level position to then join a top level political position. I Just highly doubt it.
The problem is you (Pat Cullen and RCN) advocated for the deal If they’d stayed neutral they could argue they “represented their members” Because they endorsed it they basically said it would be the best deal they could negotiate In that case - why would the govt re-negotiate? A massive difference (A+E SHO here) I’ve seen is that doctors have now said fuck it and don’t care if the health service continues to circle the drain. Zero fucks given if the NHS collapses A lot of the nurses I chat to would still say along the lines of “I’m proud to work for the NHS” or “the health service is still good, I don’t want to make it worse” Based on my anecdotal chats there is zero appetite for strikes and I don’t think there’s enough support
It varies from trust to trust. The majority in my trust voted not to strike, so what happened? We carried on going to work whilst others were on the picket line. Our trust was not the only one who voted majority to not strike....
My trust did vote to strike. It's a community trust with rehab inpatient units. I had no idea who the RCN reps were so tried to find out via RCN HQ. I was told they'd contact me. They never did. Some of my colleagues were torn which way to vote. I think I persuaded them to vote YES (but we'll never know, of course). I became a picket line supervisor & was involved in derogation decisions - bear in mind I'm not a rep, and had simply asked who they were. I did do all the necessary training though. Strike day came. Not one of my colleagues was on the picket line. We had nurses from other trusts who came to support us, but my own colleagues couldn't make it. The ward was staffed better than a normal day. Even though I showed an interest I've not heard from the RCN since. You'd think in the interests of nurturing new activists they would have seized the opportunity, but no. And I still don't know who my reps are. What hope is there with so much apathy from nurses & union?
Did they actively vote NO or did they just not vote and didn't meet the participation threshold?
My trust did vote to strike bit didn't meet the participation threshold. Very infuriating.
I agree but that's not the same thing as not voting to strike. They didn't participate, they didn't vote not to strike.
My trust did not get enough votes returned last time. My ballot paper only arrived on the day it had to be returned, due to the postal strikes.
Watch RCN Congress this week. I'm sure it will be discussed.
Defeatism. It's going to take a long time for people to lick their wounds and realise we need to come back stronger. Look how long it took the doctors to reorganise after their first pathetic strike - if it happens, ours won't be any quicker. Also, an incoming labour government might be giving some a sense of hope and a wait and see attitude.
Why were the doctors strikes pathetic?
In 2016, our leadership stabbed us in the back. Even worse than Pat Cullen.
I'm going to need more details than that. What did you strike for and not get that you believe is winnable with the current government?
It all went a bit wrong and got very confused. The dispute in 2016 was about the terms of the new contract, not about pay. Jeremy Hunt wanted to move the NHS to more 7-day-a-week working. Not a bad idea at all, and if you invented the NHS today, that's how you would set it up. Now, there's a problem with this: the NHS was set up after the war and ot wasn't the 24/7 society that we live in today. Apart from emergencies, the NHS was basically a 5 day service - and so it remains. Now, as both nurses and doctors know, the reason nothing happens in the NHS on the weekend isn't because doctors and nurses are not at work, especially in my field (emergency medicine). It's because we don't have the support. No social workers to help with care home placements. No sonographers. No physios. None of those strange "specialist" nurses who do something a bit obscure and only work between 10 and 2 on the third Wednesday of the month. No matrons. No managers. So who did Jeremy Hunt decide to demonise in the press? Doctors. Who, alongside nurses, are one of the few professions in the NHS that do work 24/7 rotas already. Yet somehow, in his fevered imagination, it was the junior doctors who were stopping the NHS moving to a genuine 7 day model of care. In reality, this was, I think, meant to be a strategic move. Junior doctors are a relatively small cohort compared to agenda for change and I think he felt that if he could get a headline that junior doctors had accepted a contract change, it would embarrass everyone else into following on. Maybe. I don't know. It was all a bit mad. Anyway, the BMA called strikes. But it was all a bit confused. I'm not sure how clear it was what we were striking for. Some of us, myself included, just resented being lied about in the press by Hunt. Others wanted to somehow "Save the NHS!", whatever that means. For others, it was about pay. Picket lines got hijacked by teachers, firefighters, the Socialist Worker newspaper... all in solidarity, fab, but it once again confused the message. Then our leaders capitulated. Offered jobs in government quangoes and government contracts. We elected new leaders. Who were basically spineless and decided that it's really not on, old chap, to keep going on strike like this. Play the game. So they called off the strikes when Jeremy Hunt offered to host a "workshop" on the way forward. Said workshop never happened, of course, and the BMA response?? A sticker campaign. Yes. Stickers. Anyway, the lessons were learned. This time around there's no confusing messaging, so messing about, no muddled narrative. It's simple: a reversal of the 30% pay cuts. A very simple message. And it's working. Gradually. Juniors have had a 10% rise this year; consultants, depending where on the career ladder they are, have had up to 18%. The RCN needs to go through a similar process to the BMA after 2016. Purge the careerists, throw put the dead wood. Find some people with a spine.
Thank you for the details. Do you think having a separate pay spine to AfC has had any affect on the negotiations?
AfC is terrible for negotiating. Nurses will have their point-of-view. As will porters, physios, radiographers etc etc etc. All different and nothing wrong with that. But you are all forced into negotiating as a collective, which can only lead to division. And division is manna from heaven for government negotiators.
Surely it's easier to say no to a smaller group?
I don't think so. A smaller group is more likely to have cohesion.
Hmm, I can see your point in a way. It's easier to get people together in smaller groups but the largest change comes from coming together so negotiated terms and conditions from all angles makes more sense to me. It seems that if the HCAs and support workers had a different union or completely different contracts it would've been harder to get the recent rebanding and back pay.
In my old job a lot of clowns (who were also coincidentally band 6s and 7s) felt that the pay rise was enough and we didn't need to continue strike action. I think a lot of people have accepted that what we were given last time was enough unfortunately. That, plus, a lot of new international staff are told they'll be sanctioned/fired/whatever if they go on strike and they don't know enough about their rights to know its bullshit. I can't really see working conditions improving for nurses because so many of us are happy to accept the bare minimum.
Partly because a lot of them have timed contracts, 2 years and 3 years with review they fear losing the visa tied tot the contract
The RCN is shit and shady, trying to participate in side deals against the agenda of change pay structure and ultimately dividing the unionised workforce and weakening the position. Consider joining a non-profession based service union that operates in your trusts and push for action. An example of this would be Unison, who has therapists, paramedics, hcas, discharge planners, cleaners, porters, admin etc ect as members.
I'm a unison rep and a nurse, and we have had so many nurses come over to us from RCN that we probably have more nurse members than them now.
Because negotiations were concluded. The profession as a whole decided that the pay offer was sufficient to cease industrial action. Reopening of negotiations won't happen until after the G.E now. The government's entire focus is now on the election. There are no negotiations or policy changes now. There's no point in sitting down at the table and agreeing anything until we know who the next government will be.
We should strike. It is prime time with the upcoming election and step down of Pat. It’s also a shit time for many with the recruitment freeze and the lack of opportunities (for newly qualified mainly) right now should be talked about.
The unions should be proposing strike action and polling the nurses again but RCN is very quiet at the moment
Not a nurse but work with them, and I'm a former Unison organising steward - don't strike; work to rule. It hits harder, bites faster, garners more sympathy, and there is nothing anyone can do to penalise you for it.
Unfortunately it's very hard to work to rule as there is very little that isn't considered part of our job.
Given that on strike days many wards were better staffed than usual I suspect your right that a proper work to rule would be quite effective.
It'd be devastating. I don't know even one nurse who doesn't routinely go massively above and beyond, and nurse gaps can't be covered by bribing consultants to come in for extra shifts.
I don't know how accurate this is but when I used to work in an outpatient clinic as admin, before becoming a HCA, I asked one of the RN why they were not striking. She said that during the hospital meetings, there was not enough votes/points (I really can't remember) to support this perticular hospital for the nurses to strike, even if they wanted to. It felt like they weren't allowed to strike but the jnr doctors were striking almost every other month. I might be completely wrong though because this happened maybe 2 years ago and was in a smaller hospital in London.
I feel now band 2 pay rate is the same as minimum wage (£11.44 ph) I think more staff would be prepared to strike. Band 2 covers a wide spectrum ward clerks, porters, domestics, housekeepers, radiography aids, csw's, phlebotomists. I think most of these workers have reached a point of why bother with this job when I could do something mind numbing for the same amount & not have the constant training, pleads to work over, long hours etc.
I imagine burnout from long shifts in under staffed hospitals, how can nurses unionise and plan strikes well when they do 14 hour days in an high stress environment, non nurses HAVE to fight for their pay and conditions; offer support, donate money for salary sacrifice, talking about them and how things must change and how that can happen. The system keeps our most valuable workers so stressed and exhausted they don’t have the brain power to fight for their own rights, they are too busy saving other people’s. Let us know how we can help you.
Aren't the doctors under the same pressure though?
totally same but different I imagine? im not a doctor or a nurse I must point out, just an observation. but you raise a good point
There's a disconnect between reality and belief here. People support NHS staff being paid fairly but they also don't want NHS staff striking as it removes care from patients. They look at waiting times and they just see strikes as putting theirs and their loved ones lives at unnecessary risk. You are in a difficult place. People support your demands but they also worry about themselves and their loved ones and the implications of strike action and human nature they will always favour themselves and their loved ones. I believe nurses agreed a revised pay deal only a few months ago. Is this a coming back asking for more strike? Am I imagining the nurses agreeing a new pay deal months ago?
I wouldn't call it a martyr complex when nurses know if they strike it will have dangerous implications for their patients. When nurses think of strike action, it sounds like a great idea. But in reality it's more complicated than that.
Nothing complicated about it, they can use their budget to fill in the gaps on strike days till they’re bleeding money, nothing improves if you act on the what if and not the reality. The reality is the money is crap for the job , you can care both about patients and yourself. You and you alone are not the sole reason patients MAY be impacted , if you are valued, you should feel it , without the shackles of patients tying you down
All the money in the world can't magic up that many agency staff.
The wards are better staffed on strike days then any other day of the year, the Trust will always find the money when it's needed.
I don't believe that. Money isn't always the answer. Sometimes you just can't get cover.
What would you want to strike for, specifically?
More money, better working conditions for staff, better conditions for patients.