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

Tens of thousands of health workers across the health service are balloting for industrial action against the pay and numbers strategy. I have raised this with the Taoiseach, the Minister for public expenditure, Deputy Donohoe, and the Minister for Health repeatedly over recent weeks. Workers are feeling forced to take industrial action because the pay and numbers strategy, despite protestations by the Government that there is no recruitment embargo, is, in effect, a recruitment ceiling or embargo by another name. It is preventing hospitals from recruiting the staff they need to ensure patient safety, safe staffing levels and to prevent the workforce from being completely overrun and demoralised, which is where many thousands of health workers are at the moment and, critically, endangering patient safety.

Is this not an absolutely incredible indictment of this Government, which has failed to properly to resource and staff our health service, that this now erupts into industrial action? Will it pre-empt the need of these workers to go on strike by simply scrapping the pay and numbers embargo on recruitment into our health service and ensure we have safe staffing levels right across that service?

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