IHC staff fight for pay

JEFF TOLAN/Timaru Daily News

PROTEST: Community support workers in Timaru continue fighting an IHC freeze on pay increases.

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Community support workers in Timaru are continuing to apply pressure on their employer, IHC, for a pay rise.

Up to 40 Timaru members of the Service and Food Workers Union Nga Ringa Tota (SFWU) walked off the job and took their message to the centre of town yesterday.

They joined several hundred disability support workers picketing national and regional offices around the country from Whangarei to Dunedin.

The SFWU represents more than 3000 community support workers employed by intellectual disability provider IHC, and has been negotiating with IHC since last October.

The union is seeking a 2 per cent pay increase; IHC is offering a 12-month pay freeze.

The workers are now into their fourth week of industrial action over the freeze.

Timaru delegate Heather Woolstencroft said workers had planned to picket outside St Thomas' Church last night in support of staff walking off the job during a second ban on "sleepovers" at group homes, which cater to more than 60 service users.

"They have to walk off the job – that's not an easy thing thing to do," she said.

Sleepover bans were scheduled to occur again today, from April 15 to April 17, and April 25 and April 26, Mrs Woolstencroft said.

SFWU National Secretary John Ryall said IHC management was refusing to pass on additional public money to the IHC workers who were on very low pay rates.

"A wage freeze in the disability support sector is unacceptable, and our members see no alternative but to continue taking industrial action until this matter is resolved," Mr Ryall said.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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