Secretary’s Report

June-July 2022

FEATURED AND FAVOURITES

3 Secretary’s Report 4 The ANF Legal Team 8 ANF in WA Cuts Fees by 25% 11 ANF Out ‘n’ About 14 ANF Helpline 16 Internet Watch 17 20 years of wage negotiations 8 page lift out 28 Across the Nation 30 The Brain Buster Crossword 32 Around the Globe 34 Recipe Corner 38 Pet Page

CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: CLINICAL UPDATES

26 Diabetic ketoacidosis – a clinical update 35 Methotrexate - a medication update 36 Iron - a medication update 37 Lactulose - a medication update

WIN!

39 ‘Atlas Of The Heart’ and

‘Experiences of Health Workers in the COVID-19 Pandemic’ books

Front cover: Clockwise from top left - Fremantle nurses at Parliament House ANF rally in 2012, nurses at the ANF Geraldton Hospital Rally in 2013, Fremantle Nurses at the Dumas House ANF Rally 2001, KEMH nurses & midwives waiting for the bus to take them to the Challenge Stadium ANF rally in 2001, SCGH nurses at one of their hospital ANF rallies in 2013… and one of the ANF bees.

ANF Assistant Secretary Janet Reah

Firstly, I want to thank outgoing State Secretary Mark Olson for his 24 years of tireless service to ANF members in Western Australia and I look forward to building on his great work.

These are the most challenging of times for all our members whether they work in the Public Sector, Private Sector or Aged Care and it will take all the unity of purpose to protect the achievements of the last two decades as well as gaining further improvements.

My focus going forward is on wages, conditions and better workloads for all ANF members.

When the McGowan Labor government came to power in 2017, WA nurses and midwives were the highest paid in the country. But as a direct result of his government’s policy of capping wage increases to $1,000 per year for four years we have been overtaken by every state and territory except Tasmania. This must change or we will be losing our local nurses and midwives to other states and be unable to attract any significant numbers to travel this side of the WA border.

Even when NSW and Victoria recently announced $3,000 bonus payments in addition to higher yearly wage increases than what is being offered in WA, the WA Premier said: “there is a material difference between what occurred in our hospitals and what the workforce had to endure and what occurred in NSW and Victoria.”

Clearly the WA Premier thinks there is nothing wrong with having a health system reliant on ANF members doing record numbers of double shifts, doing record levels of overtime and suffering record levels of unfilled vacancies each and every shift.

And talking about workloads another attraction to work in other states are the legislated nurses/midwife-to-patient ratios in Victoria and Queensland. The newly elected South Australian government has also promised to introduce legislated ratios sometime during their four year term. For our part we have contributed heavily to the current independent review by Prof Phil Della which is a review secured by the ANF in the 2020 EBA negotiations. The outcomes of this review will form part of our campaign for legislated ratios in Western Australia because it is an essential part of protecting our workforce from the workload abuses of the last two years.

I look forward to meeting more and more members during my workplace visits and working closely with you as we progress these important projects and campaigns.

Janet