About 4,000 nurses and midwives are invited to The Phoenicia hotel tonight to vote on the government’s offer of a new salary package.
If the majority accept it, the union will sign an agreement with the government that will bring a damaging, weeks-long dispute to an end. Otherwise, the government and the union will be forced to go back to the drawing board.
The Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses (MUMN) called the extraordinary general meeting after weeks of fruitless negotiations with the government. The aim is to have its members decide for themselves whether the proposed conditions are adequate.
The meeting, originally meant to take place at the Catholic Institute in Floriana, was moved across the road to The Phoenicia’s grand ballroom as the MUMN anticipates a larger turnout than initially projected.
The meeting will start at 7.30 pm with an address by union president Paul Pace following which the members will take a secret vote. All those attending will be handed a photocopy of the government’s proposal as presented to the MUMN.
There will be no other means of voting and no other voting times. The time slot was chosen because it is the time of day when the fewest nurses and midwives are at work, enabling the largest possible turnout at the meeting.
The government and the union have not seen eye to eye on the new sectoral agreement, which includes salary packages, new overtime rates and other working conditions.
The government insists the agreement is one of the most favourable ever offered to healthcare workers but the union vehemently disagrees. Nurses will still be underpaid, deprived of their rights and discriminated against, the union holds.
Details of the proposed package have not been made public but in a Times of Malta article last Sunday, ministers Chris Fearne and Jo Etienne Abela hinted at some new conditions.
Nurses’ and midwives’ take-home pay will increase by €6,000 annually and overtime worked over and above 40 hours per week will be compensated at an hourly rate multiplied by 1.5, they said.
Nursing premiums will be increased across the board and those who work more than 56 hours in a week will enjoy further compensation.
The MUMN had ordered widespread industrial action in March, raising concerns from other healthcare professions over delayed surgeries and the resultant higher risks for patients.
Among the directives, nurses stopped administering travel-related vaccinations and stopped answering the phone.
Nurses at the Gozo hospital were ordered not to assist at several clinics.
The union suspended the directives last Wednesday.