As of yesterday at 4 p.m., 4,400 employees of the Vårdförbundet have started a blockade at Sahlgrenska. The blockade means a stop to overtime and new hires, as a protest against the large amount of overtime for the professional groups that the Vårdförbundet organizes.
Malou Byström works her shift as an emergency nurse at Sahlgrenska today, but not a minute overtime.
– The atmosphere is hopeful, but there is also concern about whether the employer will be able to meet our wishes, she says.
Do you think they will be able to meet your wishes?
– I really hope so, for now that will be enough. It happens almost every shift that someone has to stay and work overtime. What happens is that people start taking sick leave because they can’t keep up. There are young, healthy people who are not fit for a regular job, so it cannot be.
Photo: Jenny Ingemarsson
How does the blockade affect the emergency department?
– It will not affect the patients, not in terms of safety anyway. It will affect us who work by getting more power. If the blockade threatens safety, our managers will order us in for protective work, and then it will be negotiated with the union.
Ellen Ekholm is a union trustee and board member in the Västra Götaland department.
– Today, it’s about going home when one’s workplace is over. If there is a risk to life and health, the employer has every right to order protective work. We want to show that healthcare is built on resources that don’t exist, she says.
Photo: Jenny Ingemarsson
What do you think the consequences of the blockade will be?
– The employer has now had two weeks to prepare. We take responsibility for identification, we have responsibility for the patient before us. But ensuring that the population in Swedish healthcare receives care is the responsibility of politics.
What do you want to see from the employer’s side?
– We protect the Swedish health and medical care. We want to see that employees in Swedish health and medical care are able to work a whole working life, we need other working time models that make us able to work.
Ellen Ekholm says that in order to solve the situation with overtime, more and more personnel are needed in the care.
Is it even possible for the employer to be able to meet your demands for reduced working hours?
– Of course, we cannot continue to pay with our health.
The blockade is not fixed in time, but will continue until an agreement has been reached with the counterparty, SKR.
According to Sahlgrenska’s hospital management, they are resetting – the ambition that the patients should not notice the blockade at all, in the short term.
– As an employer, we have to review our scheduling and prioritize having employees in place where we would otherwise find it difficult to maintain the care we should give, said Mattias BjarnegÃ¥rd, the SU leadership’s coordinator for the blockade to DN yesterday.
The parties are currently far apart. Jeanette Hedberg, head of negotiations at SKR, wants the negotiations to be resumed so that an agreement can be reached and the conflict stopped.
– We have met the Vårdförbundet in several parts, but we cannot meet the demand for shorter working hours. This is because it would entail enormous costs and risk leading to major difficulties in managing the staffing, she says.
Photo: Hans Alm
Jeanette Hedberg believes that municipalities and regions in Sweden has a deficit of ¥30 billion by 2024, and that they are already facing major financial and recruitment challenges in several businesses.
– Shortening working hours in such a situation is simply not possible. So it is for financial reasons and because of the recruitment needs that arise. Municipalities and regions cannot handle such costs. If the working hours were to be shortened by three hours a week for the contact professions in municipalities and regions, it would cost 35.6 billion and require us to recruit 62,000 more employees.
Is it reasonable to have as much overtime as staff in care work?
– High overtime withdrawals for a long time are not justifiable, and it is also up to the employer to distribute the overtime evenly so that everyone gets to help to carry that burden. Then overtime always needs to be able to be used in these businesses, you have to be able to replace people who, for example, get sick or need to vacate.
Photo: Jenny Ingemarsson
The nursing association doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t have any overtime, but that five million hours of overtime for their members is too much?
– if overtime withdrawals are too high, you must get a picture of what is causing it and take the measures required to solve the problems . It could, for example, be because there is a lack of employees with a certain competence, then it may be necessary to recruit more people with that competence, says Jeanette Hedberg.
She believes that a shortening of working hours is not the right way to go, as there is a risk that the working environment will deteriorate and that overtime withdrawals will, on the contrary, increase.
If you cannot meet the Vårdförbundet’s demand for shorter working hours, how do you think the conflict will be resolved?
– The parties are currently far from each other, and the solution lies in the demand for a reduction in working hours, which we cannot meet, but it is important to the parties go back to the negotiating table and, with the help of the mediators, now try to reach an agreement.
