Nurses and midwives have voted to double their pay claim against the McGowan government to 10 per cent a year for two years.
Furious nurses and midwives have voted to double their pay claim against the McGowan government during a packed and rowdy rally in the city.
Expected to back a 5 per cent demand, rather than the current 3 per cent on offer, the Australian Nursing Federation-led crowd of about 2,500 health workers decided to pursue their own deal outside the currect public sector negotiations.
On top of today's call for a 10 per cent pay rise per year over two years, the ANF will ask for a one-off $4,500 cost of living payment.
The government's policy, already accepted by many unions in WA, is for a $3000 one-off payment.
If the ANF members don't get their way, they are prepared to begin industrial action that would culminate in the closure of hospital beds.
"Over the past five years of this government being in power there has been a decline in recruitment, a reduction in wages in real terms and an increase in our workloads," ANF secretary Janet Reah told the rally at Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre.
"The landscape of health care has changed forever. This government has had two weeks to prepare for this meeting today, and they have done nothing."
Together with more pay, the union wants acceptable nurse-to-patient ratios mandated, as has occurred in other states. Victoria has enforced a one nurse to four patients ratio.
The fresh demands follow a further call for a royal commisison into the health system by the parents of 7-year-old Aishwarya Aswath, who died of sepsis after a failure to examine and treat her earlier at Perth Children's Hospital.
Her father, Aswath Chavittupara, has started a petition supported by the state opposition.
"The McGowan government's response to these issues is deflection and blame," opposition health spokeswoman Libby Mettam said.
"If the government was serious about addressing these significant issues across our health system they would support a independent and through invesitigation of the crisis in our health system.
"That is the circuit-breaker our system needs."
The nurses' rally erupted when told that one of Perth's major universities would be unable to fill its nursing student enrolment quota into next year.
Last month, the government said it had increased the number of graduates placed in the health system by 53 per cent.
"More than 1,130 graduates were offered a position in a metropolitan healthcare facility while 200 graduates were offered rural and regional places," a government statement read.
But the union's Ms Reah said retention was a major concern.
"The (government's) wages policy has done nothing to address the needs of every nurse and midwife in this room," Ms Reah said.
"We are determined to extract a decent pay offer from the government to attract and retain nurses and widwives."
If the government doesn't come to the table, nurses and midwives will ban any double shifts in a week's time.
Every seven days after that, different forms of industrial action will commence, including a ban on overtime, rolling strikes across a range of hospitals and indefinite strike action.
The government has shifted three times on its original pay offer to the public sector, forced to go higher as the inflation rate in WA climbed to 7.6 per cent.
Ahead of the rally, Premier Mark McGowan said there was no need for the nurses to take industrial action.
"Let's just continue the negotiations," he said. "The most important thing is for the hospitals to continue to function and we continue to negotiate in good faith."
