At the end of last week Harry Eccles a nurse living and working on the Isle of Wight bumped into the Island’s Conservative MP, Bob Seely.
Harry works for Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust (MPFT) delivering drug and alcohol support on the Island and has organised the two-day picket line outside St Mary’s Hospital which started on Wednesday.
“Dismissed” and “patronised”
Following his chat with the MP, Harry took to Twitter to share his frustration at how he felt he’d been treated.
In a series of tweets, Harry explained,
My catch up with @IoWBobSeely today
– Bob told me I am ‘politicised’ and do not represent nurses
– He told me that The #IOW is well staffed with no staffing crisis.
– He said he speaks to nurses and knows their point of view better than me
I felt that he completely disregarded my experience, and he dismissed my contribution. He accepted we spend a lot of money on private agencies, but did not accept by paying nurses fairly we would reduce this. He said IOW Nurses do not want a pay rise!
Bob told me I do not speak for nurses, and that he knows nurses better than me?!? I am disappointed that my own MP does not value my contribution, and refuses to listen to my concerns about un-safe staffing levels affecting the IOW.
He refused to talk to me as a person, and I felt he dismissed my opinion and just quoted government stats He insinuated the NHS is unsustainable, and refused to admit a decline in standards since his government have been in power Very disappointing
He refused to talk about MP’s pay rises – stating it was an independent process. When asked about the Payment review bodies not being independent, he refused to accept this.
What a kick in the teeth from my own MP
I’m happy for people to disagree, but it’s not nice to be ignored and patronised!
We asked Bob Seely
Having seen Harry’s thread of tweets and listened to what he said, News OnTheWight put the following questions to Bob Seely,
- How many IW NHS nurses have you spoken to over the last three months?
- What makes you think that IW Nurses do not want a pay rise?
- What makes you say you know nurses better than Harry, a nurse working with other nurses on a daily basis?
- Do you think the NHS is sustainable?
- How do you respond to him saying he was left feeling that you “completely disregarded” his own experience, and dismissed his contribution?
Ignored the actual questions
Bob chose to ignore the actual questions and instead sent the following reply, along several paragraphs about investment in the Island that have no relation to the questions asked (so we’ve chosen not to include them).
He said,
“My recollection of the conversation does not entirely tally with that reported.
“However, I am pleased that Isle of Wight nurses did not go on strike.”
Dealing with the facts
Despite the MP praising IW nurses for choosing “to continue to care for patients instead of opting for strike action,” in fact 86 per cent of those IW RCN nurses who voted, did actually choose to take strike action (read more).
The issue was that they didn’t quite meet the legal 50 per cent turnout threshold in the ballot, so could not follow through with strike action.
At the time, one nurse told News OnTheWight that many of their colleagues did not receive ballot papers in time.
Staffing levels
We also asked Bob to share the figures to show IW NHS is well staffed and has no staffing crisis. Bob replied,
“I am also pleased that we are filling nurse vacancies. We’ve seen 120 nurses from overseas recruited in the past year, 22 local nurses have just completed their Registered Nurse Degree and 50 Health Care Assistants are currently being inducted to fill vacancies.”
Questions to the IW NHS Trust
News OnTheWight asked the Isle of Wight NHS Trust how many vacancies they currently have, how many agency staff they are using and what is the level of staffing needed to deliver services safely.
They are gathering the information and we’ll update once we hear back from them.
Picket line continues
Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust nurses are back on the picket line outside St Mary’s today (Thursday) until 6pm.
They’ve reported huge support from the community during the two days.
You can watch videos and see more photos by visiting Harry’s twitter account.
