By DANIEL JACKSON
An employer and union in Northland are fighting together for the same cause.
Healthcare Management, which runs five elderly care facilities in Northland, and the Nurses Organisation say they will jointly lobby MPs and the Government to try to gain more money for the work they do.
Healthcare general manager
Pete Carter said the nurses' union had been negotiating for a pay rise on a collective contract since the Employment Relations Act came in at the beginning of the month.
But he said the company could not give them raises because it did not receive enough money from the Government for elderly care.
"The basis for our negotiations with the union was that if we are able to get more funding we are happy to pass on a component of that," said Mr Carter.
"The union has seen the position we are in and is happy to come alongside us and lobby."
The Health Funding Authority has rolled over contracts nationally for the care of elderly for seven months while it tries to sort out an offer it can make to all providers.
But Mr Carter said Healthcare Management could not wait because the union wanted movement on pay and conditions now.
Union organiser Carol Gilmour said that if push came to shove, nurses would strike. But at the moment, they were happy to try and work with the employer to increase funding.
Ms Gilmour said caregivers in Northland were paid between 35c and 85c less than the recommended $10.35 average wage for their type of work.
"It's probably the hardest work someone can do.
"Some caregivers are doing sometimes up to 60 [patient] lifts in an eight-hour shift."
Understaffing and overwork were leading to dangerous conditions for staff and the elderly in some homes, she said.
Jeff Richardson, a senior manager with the funding authority in Auckland, said it was still negotiating with industry representatives nationally and would not make exceptions for one company.
"As it stands, the offer we have on the table is an increase."
Lobbying MPs and Government would only complicate matters.
"It's totally inappropriate for an individual provider to start lobbying the Government when the final results from this process have not come out."
