Ambulance strike is disgraceful?

[somethingdifferenttoday]

I just read this on bbc news, "Unions say life-threatening callouts will continue to be responded to over the next 24 hours but some urgent calls, for example for late-stage labour or a fall in the home, might not be answered."

Is it just me who thinks this is disgraceful?

Late stage labour at home or an elderly person laying with a broken hip ARE emergencies! I'm not sure how people in a caring profession can strike knowing these calls will go unanswered.

The unions talk about the backlog, paramedics stuck outside hospitals in ambulances unable to unload and go back out on the road but then admit they are striking for more pay rather than as a protest about that. The average salary of ambulance staff of £47,000 and a 4% pay rise isn't enough they claim but if they are given a pay rise, they will stop striking.

I think they do deserve more money (we all do with inflation) but I can't get past them supposedly being in a caring profession but taking steps that WILL cause extra deaths regardless.

I work in the private sector and have had zero pay rise. If I went on strike nobody would die and I'd be fired. This approach is abusing the critical position of their roles. I hope they are not given a pay rise as it will just demonstrate that blackmail works to other public sector workers and we will have even more strikes.

YABU = I support them striking
YANBU = I agree, it's disgraceful behaviour from a caring profession

So the deaths the rest of the year are the fault of the government for mismanaging the NHS? Those who are paid to run the country?

I have referenced Pat Cullen repeatedly, try reading my posts

YANBU. Shocking timing.

People are dying all the time. My mum fell and broke a hip, some ribs and punctured a lung. The ambulance took 22 hours. This was in the summer. My friend gave birth 2 years ago at home and the ambulance never came. After 10 hours they cancelled it and took themselves in.

You reference Mick Lynch a lot too - don't you read your own nonsense?

@Venetiaparties The paramedic strikes (like the nurses) is predominantly about the poor conditions they are working in. Paramedics are stuck outside A&E waiting for beds so not attending patients. Then when they are attending patients they’ve been waiting far too long and are even more unwell. Outside my A&E we often have 25-30 ambulances waiting, for context we have 55 ambulances cover our areas and we aren’t the only hospital either. Thus, they are making a stand to protect their patients. I’m in complete disbelief it’s got to this but it has to be done to protect patients long term.

I have. I still don’t know what Mick Lynch has to do with ambulance workers striking.

We have paid billions into the NHS, a bottomless pit

So you agree that the government is to blame for the deaths the rest of the year due to their mismanagement of the NHS?

It’s already happening. My Dd took an overdose earlier in the year,I called 999 and was told there would be a 4/5 hour wait and to get her there myself if I could. Well I don’t drive so had to rely on my db.
so a lot of us do know how it feels when there’s no ambulance available.
OP YABU

I think that you are a bit confused if you think that Mike Lynch (in charge of the rail union) has anything to do with ambulance service strikes.😂 Perhaps stop talking nonsense and have a lie down.

Feel free to actually engage with any of my counter arguments then…

Beyond your faux outrage for my consideration of the life of my unborn child that is.

Not that you were outraged for their life yesterday, or the day before… They only matter on a strike day is it?

I note a complete lack of outrage on your part, that an ambulance didn’t arrive for me a year ago? When I was believed to be having a heart attack…. Only on a strike day does it matter…?

It is unforgivable that the ambulance service has ended up in this state. I am glad the ambulance service is trying to take a stand.

@Han91s

why shocking timing?

"We have paid billions into the NHS, a bottomless pit"

And yet...

I kind of meant generally though even regardless of strike. Someone yesterday was quoting a minimum 2 hour wait for late labour. So surely home births are a big no no now across the board?

And there is of course the fact the Tory's love disputes when they are unpopular and it's gliding towards elections, because they can bring up the old chestnut that labour are in hoc to the unions. The 'if labour are in it will be worse scenario'

The basic fact is that Brexit has caused huge staffing issues in some sectors and of course their are other war related pressures too. This means some sectors in private industry have had big rises just to be able to maintain a service, (hence higher prices ) yes that benefits some but in no way does it benefit most! I haven't posted about this for fear of being called racist , but our business centre is full every day in the last 2 months with rooms designated for dealing with visas - these are all south Asian/Indonesian and some have very poor English , complete with trailing relatives - if anyone would like to explain why that's of more benefit than young, fit Lithuanians/polish etc - then feel free to enlighten me. People were fed utter rubbish- they are clearing through masses of immigration from such places hoping to get a ton of cheap labour back in the system and keeping it quiet.

The unions have planned and executed this together. It was entirely coordinated to maximise the pain, suffering and harm to the public.

Lynch has put this together, with Pat and the rest of the unions to bring the country to its knees literally. Or do you suppose it was just a happy accident that ALL of the strikes just so happened to come together at the same time?

The unions have blood on their hands after this.

How low do you need to stoop to use the dying as a weapon for more money?

Robin Hood incarnate they most certainly are not.

YABU.

DH was on shift last night. 12 hours and they dealt with one patient. The whole shift was spent waiting at hospital for that patient to be taken in. Ambulances can't leave until patients are taken and hospitals can't take them because there are no beds. Staff are leaving left, right and centre because pay and conditions are terrible, but also because they just can't take the stress any more. It is no fun at all knowing your service is failing, that people are dying who shouldn't be, and that it feels like you are failing too even though you are doing everything you can to care for those you can reach.

And I don't know where you got £47k from because that sounds like a fantasy to me!

The NHS is fine and actually a really efficient system compared to what many other countries have.
The real problem is lack of social care and the very elderly population. If all people in their last year of life lived in nice disability friendly villages with a few doctors on site, carers etc and we would not keep certain people alive for the sake of it (and often not with their actual informed consent) the NHS would be fine.
We need to address the actual ageing population and lack of care/family support and the fact that modern medicine can keep people alive long past their best. People should be supported and be able to die with dignity.
For most of us, something like 90 per cent of lifetime NHS resources on us are spent in our last few weeks of life.

This.

Choosing for people to die is very very different from struggling to provide ambulance cover.

It is about intent.

The intent is to do harm by refusing cat 2 calls and it is not acceptable to anyone.

That’s an interesting way to look at it. The 90% part

@Venetiaparties

what do you think these nhs workers should do then?

just put up and shut up?

nah

they have been doing that for years, they’ve had enough

Unsurprisingly, this thread has turned into a Tory bashing thread. Had we not been going through a cost of living crisis, I’m doubtful we would be threatened with strikes. Everyone has less disposable salary now, and so clearly people want their pay to rise in relation to the extra money they are having to pay out for energy bills, petrol, food. Had cost of living not been an issue, there would be no strike threats. We are all suffering, and should a 19% pay rise be given, how do you think the rest of us workers would feel when we are having minimal pay rises, if anything at all? Feeding my family is just as important to me as an NHS workers is to them. Yet they know that should they get that 19% , that the rest of us will suffer as there will need to be further tax rises to subsidise their rise. How is that fair?

Yabu