Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Mark Quin: Ambulance Association Division Chairman on the impact of the St John ambulance labour strike

Transcript

Mark Quin: Ambulance Association Division Chairman on the impact of the St John ambulance labour strike · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Warning only call the ambulance today if you have life
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: threatening health issues. Saint John Ambulance staff are voted to
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: go ahead with a national withdrawal of labor after months
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: of foul pay negotiations. More than two and a half
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: thousand officers are staggering at four hour withdrawals of labor
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: until four am tomorrow. So this is all kicked off
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: in well an hour and a half ago. Now, this
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: withdrawal of labor. We're joined by Mark Quinn, who's with
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: the New Zealand Ambulance Association. Mark, good morning, good morning,
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: thanks for being with us. What is the worst time
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: to call an ambulance today? Do you have an idea?
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: No, I mean I think in every person's world there's
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: always never a good time to call an ambulance. Would
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: be the simple way to call it.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, they're saying this is Saint John have mentioned
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: between the hours of six and ten am and then
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: ten to six to ten pm tonight, just because of
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: the way that shifts are structured and stuff.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so of course there is life preserving services across
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: and particularly covering from six to ten would be at
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: a time and six till ten tonight as well. That's
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: where generally the shifts on these multiple times when shifts
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: are changing over and even in Auckland which has an
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: exception and it has what we call swing shifts, so
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: those shifts start at various times eight nine, ten o'clock
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: through the twelve o'clock, So again those tifts will be
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: incurring a late start of four.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Hours and we'll be operating at seventy percent capacity. Is
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: that enough for the life preserving side of it?
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Well, to be honest, that's what we run sometimes on
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: a daily basis. We've run lower than that at times
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: due to sick calls, particularly when we had COVID. So yeah,
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: some days in some areas. And that's the first interesting
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: feedback we're getting back that some of the areas are
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: not noticing the difference because they're running that low that
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: sometimes with ambulances due to various reasons.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: How low do we go?
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: Good question, and this is the question we're asking, do
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: you want to have a third world run eminand service
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: or a first world eminance service which is well funded?
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: And that's the underlying issue.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Mark, what's the shortfall at the moment between what the
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: unions want and what acc and how new Zealand are
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: willing to fund Saint John.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: An actual percentages. You know, there's at least we haven't
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: got into the numbers, but we're probably well that offer
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: has been made below inflaciery pressures and we need to
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: get it up above a flation pred because we're playing.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: We're nine months into an agreement and it's all very
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: well for people, just you know, politicians are particularly excited
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: in the coalition government to talk about allowing CPI, but
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: you know, we've been missing out and we had a
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: previous deal that was at six percent that Saint John
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: pulled out of where it was a sign seal settlement
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: and they pulled out of it. So this is that
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: this is our problem, expecting us to take a live
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: percentage on one that they had previously agreed to.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: What are they what are they offering if not.
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: Sex well below CPI. The at the moment there's a
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: two in there.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: What a two? It starts with a two yep. So
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: we've got a way to go, haven't we. And more
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: strike actions planned for Saturday for those who are interested. Mark,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: Thanks for your time. Mark Quen The New Zealand Ambulance
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Association twenty for.
• 3:49
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• 3:53
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• 3:56
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