The Berejiklian Government's move to freeze the wages of public servants has angered local nurses and midwives who protested (social distancing) in their own time on Tuesday, June 2.
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Manning nurses protested during their lunch break out front of Manning Base Hospital, one of more than 60 similar protests by the rNSW Nurses and Midwives' Association (NSWNMA) branches statewide.
Manning branch of NSWNMA president, Scott Grant, said the freeze on the 2.5 per cent pay rise actually equates to a 5 per cent cut for nurses, as their award runs from July to July and the freeze is in place until November 2021.
"Our superannuation will drop and we won't catch up," Scott said. Young nurses are being dealt the biggest blow, he said, with a reduction in lifetime earnings impacting by up to $17,000 on their superannuation in the end.
A lot of experts believe the wage freeze is a bad economic strategy, says Manning branch secretary David Conning. "To speed up economic recovery you need to give people money to spend."
Many of the 400,000 public sector workers, not just nurses, are single parents. In other cases many of the workers' partners have lost their jobs.
"Nurses and midwives are insulted the government has chosen to ignore the sacrifices they make each day at the bedside, and more so in light of the COVID-19 pandemic," a spokesperson for the NSWNMA said.
"Nurses and midwives believe the public sector wage freeze would harm regional communities and have called on all politicians to reject the government's plan when parliament sits on Tuesday."
