I should like to thank the Chair for allowing me to raise this very important health matter which is affecting patient care in the south east region and particularly in the new hospital in Ardkeen. It gives us no pleasure to raise these subjects but we have a crisis in the health services. Is the Minister aware of that crisis? The Minister should intervene immediately in this dispute which has led to a stoppage of work by nurses in Ardkeen Hospital.
I compliment the nurses for the way they acted in this dispute which was to highlight the difficulties in staff levels at the hospital. Their picket was not an allout picket. They also managed to introduce, with some assistance from their colleagues, a procedure whereby no patient was neglected today at the Hospital.
The decision by the nursing staff to have this one-day token strike was a difficult one for them. Bearing in mind the mounting problems facing them and the intolerable working conditions in Ardkeen Hospital they were left with no other option.
The nursing staff are demanding a minimum of an extra 14 nurses so that their nursing duties can be carried out in accordance with their medical training and their responsibilities. Last year the workload at this hospital — a new regional hospital — increased by a staggering 25 per cent in many faculties and by more in some. The increased activities affect all areas of treatment. This increase in workload has occurred in the paediatric unit, in the intensive care unit where consultant anaesthetists were increased from one to three, in medical and surgical wards, the neonatal wards and the day care wards.
Yesterday, 13 patients required beds in the day care ward but three beds were available. Like a game of chess the nurses had to move patients from beds to chairs such was the demand in the day care ward yesterday. Does the Minister expect the same service in this hospital to be maintained by the board when the activity of the hospital has increased by almost 25 per cent, when the allocation has not been increased in accordance with that and the nursing levels have not been increased to meet this demand? There have been some increases over the past two years but nurses are not able to keep pace with the demands.
The Minister has agreed to spend £36 million on this new purpose built 424 bed hospital. The Minister in the House this year, in reply to one of my questions, said: "This hospital is geared to the needs of the 21st century." Yet, at the same time, he expects the existing staff numbers to service the extra beds and units. It would appear rather contradictory that a Minister on the one hand is prepared to invest £36 million without providing the proper and adequate staffing. Surely, in the context of the overall cost of the hospital, the provision of a mere extra 14 nurses would be a reasonable request.
The decision of the staff in Ardkeen Hospital to go on strike to highlight the impossible working conditions they are expected to work under is a mere microcosm of events occurring in all health boards. I read today that nurses in the Mater Hospital have decided to work to rule next week and——
