16 May 2004

Striking mental health workers support calls for pay equity

“National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) members on strike at private mental health provider Richmond Fellowship fully support the bid for pay equity for nurses. In addition, our members believe that what’s good enough for nurses is good enough for all health workers” said NUPE Organiser John Kerr.

“The recommendations of The Pay Equity Taskforce don’t go far enough. Our union believes the government needs to allocate funding now out of the $7 billion surplus for the direct funding of undervalued and low wage workers across the health sector. This includes staff at organisations like Richmond Fellowship who are paid as little as $11 per hour looking after some of the most vulnerable and challenging members of society”, said John Kerr

“Publicly funded yet contracted out of the public health system, workers at Richmond Fellowship are being disadvantaged by a government that pays lip service to the concept of pay equity whilst failing to front up with hard cash”, said John Kerr.

NUPE members have been undertaking low level strike action since April in support of their pay claims, they have issued notice of a 48 hour withdrawal of labour on the 19 & 20 May.

ENDS

© Scoop Media