Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Unfortunately, for the first time since 1999, the country’s nurses and midwives have gone on strike across the health service and in the absence of any meaningful engagement with the Government, industrial action is to be further escalated. Today is the third full day of an INMO strike. No nurse or midwife, whether they go into psychiatric nursing or other areas of nursing, ever trained to stand outside a hospital while there were patients inside it. The Government should engage in good faith with the INMO and try to end the dispute once and for all.

The health service is under fierce pressure. It is absolutely creaking, even on a normal day with a full contingent of staff. How many more patients' appointments have to be cancelled before both parties get back into the Workplace Relations Commission and the Labour Court?

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