Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Many stories will be told in the coming years about 2020 and 2021. This pandemic is a time of fierce challenges, loss and sadness. We must not, however, let it go down in the annals as a time of unfairness and inequality. I ask the House to imagine how we will be judged by future generations if we do not help the very people who put their lives at risk for our sake and theirs. Instead we turned our backs and refused to help them with a small financial reward and suspended placement. This is what the Government is doing by failing to pay student nurses and midwives. It is entirely unacceptable. The 18 students on placement in Wexford General Hospital and the other 4,000 deserve better. Throughout this pandemic student nurses and midwives have worked hard and tirelessly every day to protect our families and communities from Covid-19 while coping with a healthcare service hampered by years and years of austerity cuts. These problems are down to chronic underinvestment that began long before this pandemic and illustrate the type of pressured environment in which our student nurses, midwives and radiographers are coping. It is no wonder we have a recruitment and retention crisis and so many of our young nurses and midwives emigrate to Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

Let us remember too those on the front line who have paid the ultimate price. Only this week we have had the death from Covid-19 of a nurse in County Wexford. Our thoughts are first and foremost with his wife and young child. We cannot imagine the grief they are going through. Anyone who took the time to read the way he was spoken about in the local media reports will see he was a much-loved and respected family man.

We cannot lose sight of what our people are facing out there and the truly unimaginable suffering and loss. This is why we are putting forward Deputy Cullinane's motion today. The public are ahead of the Government. They are calling for our student nurses and midwives, who are giving everything they have in this most unequal contest, to be paid for their work. It is not too late for the Government to change the chartered course in order that we can look back and say that at least we properly paid those on the front line for the personal sacrifices they made to protect us all. The Minister should not forget that we will all be remembered by the tracks we leave behind. I urge all Deputies in the House, including my fellow Deputies from Wexford, to support the motion.

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