Faye McCann: First Union Spokesperson on the ambulance workers striking later this month

Ambulance workers say the call to strike boils down to ensuring their voices are heard. 

2,500 members from First Union and the Ambulance Association have voted on industrial action. 

Labour will be withdrawn for four hours across two days —August 20 and 24— amid calls for the Government to fulfil an election promise to renegotiate funding. 

First Union spokesperson Faye McCann told Ryan Bridge 95% of its members voted to strike. 

She says it's unfortunate and not the ideal situation. 

The Government says it will continue with the current contract for now. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
More than two and a half thousand ambulance offices are
going on strike this month. It comes after failed pay
negotiations with Saint John, who says it has no money
and is relying on Health New Zealand to bring something
to the table. First Union and Ambulance Association members voted
to stagger four hour withdrawals of labor over two days.

(00:20):
Famer Can is with First Union, She's with us this morning, Fae.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
How will this work? This withdrawal of labor.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
Yeah, so our members basically will show up to work late,
four hours late on the twenty s and on the
twenty fourth of August.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
And how will that affect the service?

Speaker 3 (00:41):
So there will be less ambulances available, there'll be less
call handlers to answer calls, less the statues. Ultimately, we
do go on to an agreement with Saint John to
provide minimum staffing numbers, so it'll bear reduced service, but
there'll still be ambulances available there for people.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
When you it's how many any of your members are
going to be turning up late?

Speaker 3 (01:03):
So we represent a thousand members and astoundingly, ninety five
percent of them were keen to take this action. It's
unfortunate that we've got to the stage. Obviously it's not
the ideal situation, and we took a lot of different
strike actions before this, but ultimately the government has chosen
to ignore their voices. So this is then making sure
that they're heard.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
So that's a thousand of your members who won't be
coming for the first four hours of the shift. Do
you know how many will with the life preserving agreement
You're going to nut out with Saint John, how many
will be on board?

Speaker 3 (01:39):
I know we're not into that detail.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
At the moment. Is it going to will people die?

Speaker 3 (01:46):
We're hoping that people won't die, but they will certainly
be delayed. Ultimately, what we would like is the government
to step in to give more funding because the issue
that we're seeing is if our members don't take action now,
is ultimately the ambulance of us is going to crumble.
So although it's some of this is to do with
pay that, ultimately it is to do with them going

(02:06):
to work each day in a system that's not working
and then seeing the risks if it continues to work
in that way.

Speaker 1 (02:13):
Faye, one of our listeners is just texting to say
don't call the ambulance call an uber, they'll get you
to hospital quicker.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Ye. Are people going to have to do stuff like that?

Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, But the sad reality is that that's say on
a day to day basis at the moment, that's what
we're hearing that people are like, our members are going
to people who have been waiting for hours and they
shouldn't have been waiting for hours.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Faith, Thanks for your time this morning, Famercan, the National
Ambulance coordinator for First Union. For more from News Talks
B listen live on air or online, and

Speaker 3 (02:45):
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