Porters at the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust have notified the Trust that they are taking further action from 6pm on Friday 3rd November until 6am on Monday 6th November 2017.
Alan Doyle & Greg Ticehurst are the UNISON Representatives from the department and explain the issue below:
“We are in dispute because of 12 hour shifts that managers are looking to force upon us.
We have told managers time and time again that we, as Porters, cannot achieve 12 hour shifts, we believe these working arrangements would be a risk to both staff and patients – the evidence we have presented shows this, they won’t listen.
The Porters here at this Trust are Band 1 Porters, amongst the lowest paid staff in the NHS, despite this, 96% of us have voted for Strike Action, we’ve done this because we believe in our cause and in each of our colleagues standing together to raise our heads up to be heard where our managers have failed to listen.”