“Honest Day’s Work Is Required Of Staffs”

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30737, 29 April 1965, Page 6

“Honest Day’s Work Is Required Of Staffs”

An honest day’s work was required of hospital staffs in return for greatly improved pay and conditions, the North Canterbury Hospital Board treasurer (Mr J. J. Morgan) said in his annual report, adopted by the board yesterday. This remark was prompted by disclosures during the investigations needed in implementing the latest pay regulations, he said. “With the introduction of an industrial type of pay structure for nurses, an industrial pattern of organisation must come to hospital nursing services,” he said. “The new regulations involve the board in organising its nursing services within a framework of penal payments, overtime, call-back and divid-

ed shift payments, in just the same way as any industrial or commercial undertaking must do. “If the same professional and personal nursing standard can be given, and at the same time a business standard of labour utilisation and cost achieved, there will be some recompense for the extra cost.”

Commenting on Mr Morgan’s statement, the chairman of the board’s finance committee (Mr J. B. Hay) said the remarks were not directed at any particular section of the staff. “We don’t mean everybody—all I can say to anyone who feels offended is, ‘lf the cap fits, wear it’,” said Mr Hay. Wages comprised 69 per cent of the board’s budgeted expenditure, he added.