{"id":14463,"date":"2025-07-31T05:16:17","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T17:16:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=14463"},"modified":"2025-07-31T05:16:17","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T17:16:17","slug":"thousands-across-new-zealand-strike-over-nurse-pay-and-lack-of-staffing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=14463","title":{"rendered":"Thousands across New Zealand strike over nurse pay and lack of staffing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Thousands of them walked off the job at 9am Wednesday for 24 hours over their deadlocked contract negotiations, which have dragged on since September.<\/p>\n<p>Health Minister Simeon Brown insists the pay offer on the table is fair, and accuses the union of hurting thousands of patients with its hard-line tactics.<\/p>\n<p>On the picketline in Wellington today, Pip Cresswell told RNZ she quit her job as a charge nurse because she was sick of not being allowed to fill vacancies and working more than 60 hours a week to cover.<\/p>\n<div class=\"block-item\">\n<div class=\"c-play-controller u-blocklink\" data-uuid=\"f38e72f3-3b01-4438-bb5f-0ec3930730cc\">\n<div>\n<article class=\"relative w-full h-screen max-h-[calc(10rem*var(--base-multiplier))] min-h-[calc(6rem*var(--base-multiplier))] bg-off-white\">\n<div class=\"flex h-full\">\n<div class=\"relative aspect-square h-full flex-none overflow-hidden\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"absolute h-full w-full object-cover\" src=\"https:\/\/media.rnztools.nz\/rnz\/image\/upload\/s--G_iieSFu--\/c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,h_100,q_auto,w_100\/v1671591260\/4LGF99X_checkpoint_internal_cover_png?_a=BACCd2AD\" alt=\"\" width=\"100\" height=\"100\" aria-hidden=\"true\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"flex w-full flex-grow flex-col justify-between overflow-hidden p-3\">\n<div class=\"flex flex-col gap-2\">\n<h3 class=\"order-2 mb-2 text-black line-clamp-2 text-sm\">Nurse says hospital conditions are \u2019worst in 30 years\u2019<\/h3>\n<div class=\"order-1 flex items-baseline gap-3 text-xs leading-tight\"><span class=\"font-sans-semibold line-clamp-1 text-heavy-grey\">Checkpoint<\/span><span class=\"whitespace-nowrap tabular-nums text-xs text-heavy-grey\">30 July 2025<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"flex items-center justify-between gap-2\">\n<div class=\"flex items-center gap-3\">\n<div class=\"flex items-center\"><\/div>\n<p><button class=\"inline-flex items-center justify-center whitespace-nowrap rounded-full border text-sm transition-colors *:transition-colors disabled:cursor-not-allowed font-sans-normal px-2 py-[calc(0.1rem*var(--base-multiplier))] py-[calc(0.1rem*var(--base-multiplier))] pl-1 leading-tight hover:text-white *:hover:text-white hover:bg-brand hover:border-brand *:text-dark-grey border-white bg-white text-black [&amp;&gt;svg]:text-brand !pr-2 [&amp;&gt;span]:text-black [&amp;&gt;span]:hover:!text-white\" aria-label=\"Queue Nurse says hospital conditions are \u2019worst in 30 years\u2019\"><span class=\"mr-2\">Queue<\/span><\/button><\/div>\n<div class=\"ml-auto flex items-center gap-2 text-black\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve got 7000 staff in Capital and Coast Hutt Valley and we&#8217;ve got 1000 positions empty. But we&#8217;re being replaced at the rate that people left last week, so we&#8217;re never going to get the 1000 people back.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Four bus-loads of nurses, midwives and healthcare assistants from Wellington joined forces with colleagues from Hutt Hospital to march past Parliament to offices shared by the Health Ministry and Te Whatu Ora at the top of Molesworth Street.<\/p>\n<p>Hutt emergency department nurse Seteli Pelasio said the risk to patients was the worst she had seen in 30 years.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photo-captioned photo-captioned-full photo-cntr eight_col \"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/media.rnztools.nz\/rnz\/image\/upload\/s--reQZJjGu--\/ar_16:10,c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,q_auto,w_1050\/v1753842948\/4K3GBGD_nurse_strike_jpg?_a=BACCd2AD\" alt=\"Nurses and healthcare assistants strike outside Britomart Station in Auckland.\" width=\"1050\" height=\"787\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-captioned__information\"><span class=\"caption\">Nurses and healthcare assistants strike outside Britomart Station in Auckland.\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"credit\">Photo:\u00a0Wallace Chapman<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8220;Bloody scary, it is so scary at the moment. Not just the lack of staffing, but the experience, the staff mix on the floor.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Specialist diabetes nurse prescriber Anne-Marie Frew said the nurse shortage meant there was a two-year wait list for patients to get insulin pumps in the region.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m scared, I&#8217;m really worried about risk. I&#8217;m working in diabetes where we&#8217;ve had no increase in our nursing resources for 16 years, despite the exponential growth in people with diabetes, and the technology.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Labour&#8217;s health spokesperson Dr Ayesha Verrall joined the march past the Beehive.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Some of the nurses here today I worked with when I was a specialist at Wellington Hospital. I&#8217;m really concerned about some of the things they have to say about understaffing in public hospitals. We can all see that things are getting worse rather than better.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Brown blamed the Nurses Organisation for postponing care for 4300 patients.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;These are patients who&#8217;ve been waiting far too long on wait lists, who have now been told they have to wait longer. That&#8217;s the unfortunate reality of the nursing union deciding to strike today.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Nurses Organisation chief executive Paul Goulter, who was among the 500-strong picket outside Waikato Hospital today, blamed the government for short-changing the public health system.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photo-captioned photo-captioned-full photo-cntr eight_col \"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/media.rnztools.nz\/rnz\/image\/upload\/s---Jbrs7VK--\/ar_16:10,c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,q_auto,w_1050\/v1753835933\/4K3GGV7_Media_36_jpg?_a=BACCd2AD\" alt=\"Nurses protest about dangerous staffing levels, at the Hamilton Gardens on 30 July, 2025.\" width=\"1050\" height=\"787\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-captioned__information\"><span class=\"caption\">Nurses protest about dangerous staffing levels at the Hamilton Gardens.\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"credit\">Photo:\u00a0Libby Kirkby-McLeod \/ RNZ<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8220;The issue is it&#8217;s all about the money and funding and the government has to stump up to restore safe staffing at our hospitals.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>rnz<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thousands of them walked off the job at 9am Wednesday for 24 hours over their deadlocked contract negotiations, which have dragged on since September. Health Minister Simeon Brown insists the pay offer on the table is fair, and accuses the union of hurting thousands of patients with its hard-line tactics. On the picketline in Wellington [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":14464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14463"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14465,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14463\/revisions\/14465"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}