Tasmanian Ambos Walk Off The Job Over Battle For Improved Pay And Conditions

Tasmanian paramedics will take industrial action and walk off the job on time on Thursday amid ongoing issues over pay and work conditions.

The unprecedented strike comes amid a backlog of claims the union logged with Ambulance Tasmania dating back to early this year.

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“They’ve just had enough,” Health and Community Services Union industrial manager Robbie Moore said.

“We’ve been trying to raise issues about safety and fatigue with management for some time,” Moore said. “We put in the claims at the start of the year and have had just two meetings which were a waste of time.”

Moore said fatigue was a major concern for ambos with a “very high” number of paramedics off work on sick leave or workers’ compensation.

“By employing more staff, they would be saving money on overtime.

“We need to employ more paramedics and pay them more because our pay rates are falling behind other key states and the work here is so hard, we can’t attract people from interstate like we used to," Mr Moore said.

“A few Band-Aids won’t fix this”

The union has stressed that patients would not be put in jeopardy when paramedics finished their shifts at 6pm on Thursday.

“Ambulance ramping is a huge problem, and it is getting worse so paramedics have decided that when their shifts finish, they will walk off the job when usually they would stay on,” Moore said.

“We will let management know in plenty of time for contingencies to be put in place.

“We don’t know how many people will be affected but at times there are up to eight ambulances ramped outside the RHH and they usually have two paramedics in them each with a patient,” he said.

It follows a one-off $2000 cash bonus to Tasmanian Health Service and Ambulance Tasmania staff along with others in the sector from the state government amid industrial action and wages negotiations. 

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