Wednesday 23rd October - Ambulance personnel members of the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) from around the country protested at Leinster House, Kildare St. today for the fourth time in demand of their right to be represented by the PNA as the union of their choice.
Today’s protest marks a resumption of the PNA ambulance branch campaign which has seen 500 PNA members (including paramedics, advanced paramedics and emergency medical technicians) strike for eight days in total in what is now the longest running industrial dispute in the HSE.
Peter Hughes, PNA General Secretary said that as the dispute enters its second year, PNA ambulance branch members were once again being forced onto the streets outside Leinster House to show their determination to have the basic right of any worker to join and be represented by the union of their choice.
“The message from today’s Dail protest is that this campaign has not gone away, and ambulance personnel remain as determined and resolute as ever to achieve their right to be members of, and represented by, the PNA, a trade union with over 40 years standing in the health and social care services”.
“Our campaign has received broad cross-party support from Oireachtas members, and a public petition now has more than 10,000 signatures in support of our demands. We are hugely encouraged by the level of political and public support we are receiving and our message to all of the political parties is that ambulance personnel will be ensuring that in any forthcoming election this dispute is raised as an election issue throughout the country.”
Media Contact: Derek Cunningham 086-2430535
