Nurses across Cumbria to strike?
The Royal College of Nursing is balloting it's members for industrial action the first time ever in England and Wales
Nurses across Cumbria will start voting next month on whether to strike over pay in what is being described as a "defining moment" for the profession.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said it will be recommending hundreds of thousands of its members support industrial action in a ballot that opens in mid-September.
The postal ballot will ask RCN members working for the NHS in England and Wales on Agenda for Change contracts if they will take strike action which involves a complete withdrawal of labour.
The vote will open on Thursday September 15 for four weeks.
Last month the Government announced a pay award the RCN said leaves an experienced nurse more than £1,000 worse off in real terms, describing it as "a national disgrace".
RCN officials said industrial strike action was a last resort, but the current NHS staffing crisis was causing "unacceptable risk" to patients and staff.
Pat Cullen, RCN general secretary, said:
"Nursing staff will stop at nothing to protect their patients.
"Staff shortages are putting patient safety at risk and the Government's failure to listen has left us with no choice but to advocate for strike action.
"A lifetime of service must never mean a lifetime of poverty. Ministers' refusal to recognise the skill and responsibility of the job is pushing people out of the profession.
"The next prime minister must change course urgently."
Carol Popplestone, who chairs the RCN Council, said in a message to members: "After years of underpayment and staff shortages, the fight for fair pay must strengthen.
"This year's pay award does not help you with the rising cost of living. It will do nothing to help to recruit or retain more nursing staff where you work and will not keep patients safe."
The Director of the RCN in the North West, Estephanie Dunn added:
"Our members have not had an inflation matching pay award for years and that financial detriment does add up.
"We need people who are at work and present and not worrying about the bills, feeding the kids or the rising cost of childcare so they can be totally present and focused on patient care because worrying about finance does take up head space.
"They are actually people who have bills to pay, families to keep.
"They need to sit down and seriously consider the evidence that the RCN put forward to the pay review committe. For them to dismiss it out of hand and put a pay offer on the table that left so many of them so much worse off, did feel like and was a slap in the face."