Patience runs out for health workers denied decent wages

Allied health professionals whose industrial action this week was called off on Friday said they had been frustrated by delays in talks for a renewed collective agreement, that were stalled twice by the 2019 political crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Talks for the updating of their 2013 collective agreement had been ongoing since 2017, but months of negotiations had led nowhere. Only towards the end of 2019 were both parties – the government and the UHM – heading back on track to negotiations, when the political crisis which prompted the resignation of Joseph Muscat, kicked in.

Yet when the union was given another date for negotiations in March 2020, this was cancelled due to COVID-19.

One speech-language pathologist who represents her section at the UHM, said that while the industrial actions of last week had impacted upon patients, their demands were reasonable and important for the roles they carry out in hospital and community care.

“The 2013 agreement ensured satisfactory wages, which in turn encourages people to take up our professions. But with our current working conditions and salaries this is not happening and it has led to a huge vacuum of human resources, with no staff to cover for others.

“Better conditions ensure that each individual progresses and specializes and is continuously up to date with changes in medicine to ensure the best interventions to our patients.”

Allied health professionals comprise audiologists, biomedical scientists, dental hygienists and technologists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, podiatrists, radiographers and speech language pathologists. Together, these professionals form part of a chain of staff inside hospitals whose work affects health outcomes for various patients, as well those brought in for emergency or elective surgery, and for their recovery afterwards.

“We work autonomously and together with doctors and nurses to ensure patients receive the best medical care… we deal with peoples’ lives. One mistake and our patient can die. A wrong diagnosis may result in inappropriate treatment,” the speech-language pathologist said.

The therapist also said that when COVID-19 pushed Malta into lockdown, allied health union stewards parked the collective agreement.

“We put on our scrubs, worked long shifts in very uncomfortable clothing; some of us were seeing patients, others volunteered to work exclusively with COVID-positive patients in so called ‘dirty areas’, while others volunteered in wards and swabbing centres.

“But we also rented out other places and we did not see our families and children for months. All the while we worked under duress with a bug we knew little about, adjusting to ever-changing protocols, and getting paid as health professionals on the rates of 2013 – the majority of us, professionals with masters degrees, earn less than €1,500 a month.”

The therapist said that at the end of the “war on COVID”, the union had requested that negotiations resume.

“Unfortunately, six weeks into the meetings, we were left with no other choice but to remind the government of how essential we are, unfortunately to the detriment of our patients.”