Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I wish to apologise to the ambulance paramedics because I meant to raise this matter last night in the context of the debate with the Tánaiste. There are many angles to that discussion, but one is the attitude the Government takes to negotiating with trade unions or representative organisations. A huge contrast was glaringly apparent, and this is directly related to the issue of social dialogue. At around the same time that the then Taoiseach was sending back channel packages to his mate in the National Association of General Practitioners, NAGP, he was refusing repeated requests from Deputy Bríd Smith, former Deputy Ruth Coppinger and others to engage with the National Ambulance Service Representative Association, NASRA, the ambulance paramedics. The then Taoiseach said explicitly at the time that one could join whatever union one wishes to join, but it does not have to be recognised. The HSE does not have to recognise it.

The then Taoiseach refused the requests to instruct the HSE to engage with the ambulance paramedics and said - this is relevant to the evidence the Tánaiste gave yesterday - that the Government engages with the trade union movement through ICTU. That was the Government policy. I do not agree with that policy. I believe it should engage with the organisations by whom workers choose to be represented. Clearly, however, the then Taoiseach did not abide by that policy. He operated a back channel to his mate in the NAGP, but would not extend the same courtesy to the ambulance paramedics, who are still denied recognition by the HSE. What does the Taoiseach think of that in terms of double standards and not being willing to recognise the chosen representatives of a group of workers, in this case ambulance paramedics?

I wish to make a second point. On 20 October, I raised with the Taoiseach the issue of student nurses and the failure to pay them. They were given healthcare assistant pay in March and April, rightly, for the major role they were playing in the dangerous environment of Covid-19. The Taoiseach said that they should get the pay they got in March and April and that he would follow through on it. Nothing has happened since then. When I asked the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, last night about paying these student nurses, he essentially made it clear that it was not the Government's intention. These student nurses are, in many cases, holding hospital wards and health workplaces together in the context of Covid-19, in which massive numbers of employed staff are out of work because of extraordinarily high levels of infection with Covid-19 among nurses and healthcare assistants. It is unacceptable that we continue to exploit them when they are holding workplaces together on the front line in dealing with Covid-19. There is much anger among student nurses about this. The Taoiseach should follow through on the commitment he made to me on 20 October and ensure that the exploitation of student nurses ends and that they are given the respect and remuneration they deserve for the role they are playing in the fight against Covid-19.

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