Nurses are threatening a strike at Hawke’s Bay and Wairoa hospitals for the first time in two years, which has led to Te Whatu Ora Hawke’s Bay issuing a call for volunteers to come forward to help provide staffing cover.

The New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO) is considering nationwide strike action for 24 hours next Wednesday, August 9, from 7am.

However, the NZNO could pull the plug on that strike if members employed by Te Whatu Ora (formerly Health NZ) accept an offer currently on the table for a revised collective agreement.

NZNO industrial services manager Glenda Alexander said the “majority of nurses” at the two public hospitals in Hawke’s Bay belonged to the union which also represents health care assistants and some midwives. It also covers nurses working in the community.

The current offer from Te Whatu Ora includes a salary increase of $4000 for the bulk of nurses and a further 3 per cent increase next April.

“We were going for the cost of living increase and we all know that is pretty hard to define, but we were looking up around the 6 per cent [mark] or so, which is the current inflation rate,” Alexander said.

“The pay offer falls short of members’ expectations and it is challenging.”

She said staffing levels were also a sticking point.

Nurses strike at Hawke's Bay Hospital in 2021. Photo / Warren Buckland

Alexander said members had until midday on August 7 to have a say on whether to accept the offer and a decision would then be made on the strike.

Alexander said there was a Life Preserving Agreement in place between Te Whatu Ora and NZNO, which ensures emergency and essential services are always maintained at hospitals even during strikes.

“We agreed on the levels of the people that we will leave behind [during the strike] and that is based on the employers making every effort to reduce the volumes, in other words to cancel or postpone routine elective [procedures] or combine wards and anything else they can do to reduce demand on the day.”

She said it was “a bit odd” Te Whatu Ora Hawke’s Bay was calling for volunteers given that agreement was in place.

As it has done in the past, Te Whatu Ora Hawke’s Bay (formerly the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board) has called for any registered nurses within the community - who hold a current practising certificate - to volunteer to help cover the striking nurses.

People willing to perform “non-clinical roles” are also being asked to volunteer.

Non-clinical roles include helping deliver meals, making cups of tea, filling water jugs, feeding patients where necessary, and assisting ward staff with jobs like answering phones or helping with mobility aides.

Volunteers will undergo health and safety and privacy training prior to the strike. Email [email protected] if you would like to volunteer.

The NZNO represents more than 55,000 nurses and health workers nationally.

On Monday, the NZNO agreed on a historic gender pay equity settlement with Te Whatu Ora which will see some nurses and staff receive lump sums and backpay. That was separate to the collective agreement negotiations.