The case in summary: • Health worker Mandy Hommen in Fredrikstad has never had a full-time position after graduating in 2015.• Fredrikstad municipality has reduced purchasing from temp agencies a lot, but still uses many of its own temps.• The trade union asks the government to cut the use of temps in the health sector, and believes that the money can instead be used to staff up.• Health Minister Jan Christian Vestre says that the government has given a clear message to the healthcare system to staff up and have full positions. The summary is made by an AI service from OpenAi. The content is quality assured by news’s journalists before publication. – I didn’t have free time at weekends and it affected my social life, says Mandy Hommen. She started with only 12 per cent permanent position as a new graduate in 2015, and had to add extra shifts to make it work. Today, the 31-year-old is a healthcare worker in a care home in Fredrikstad with a 90 per cent position. It’s still not enough. – I’m holding on and hope to get a full position, says Mandy. Has used up the temporary agency budget Fredrikstad has both a large pool of employed temporary workers and, until last year, had extensive use of hired temporary workers from temporary employment agencies. But the municipality has now reversed this. – We spend too much money on temporary workers. But from last year to this year, we have reduced purchases from temp agencies from NOK 25 million to just half a million in the first half of the year, says Janka Ekrem Holstad, head of health in Fredrikstad municipality. Nevertheless, what she calls a tight temp agency budget has already been used up for this year, with use of own temporary workers, with some working as purely on-call temporary workers. The municipality is trying to find new ways to reduce the need to buy temporary services. That’s what health manager in Fredrikstad Janka Ekrem Holstad says. Photo: Lars Håkon Pedersen / news Holstad explains that it is difficult to get the on-duty schedules at weekends to work with their own employees. – There are vacancies that we have to cover at the weekend, in the evening and at night. And then there is sickness absence, which we have not completely reduced. It is 1 percent higher after the pandemic. She believes the solution is not to hire more people, but rather to make agreements that provide more flexibility and room for more full-time positions. Fredrikstad is far from alone in running a healthcare system that is dependent on hired temporary workers and healthcare workers in tiny positions. Asking the government to intervene Last year, the municipalities in the country spent NOK 1.9 billion to fill gaps in the duty schedules with temporary workers, a good portion of which is obtained from temporary employment agencies. The municipalities must spend money on hiring people instead of buying in expensive temporary workers, believes the trade union leader Mette Nord. Photo: Peder Bergholt / news It provokes the head of the Trade Union, Mette Nord. – The government must give the health organizations and the municipality a deadline to organize it in a different way. You can staff up the sums you currently spend on letting, says Nord. Health and care minister Jan Christian Vestre (Ap) says that the government has given a clear March order to the health care system to staff up. Health and Care Minister Jan Christian Vestre (Ap) says that they have given instructions to focus on full-time positions in hospitals and municipalities. Photo: Magnus Skatvedt Iversen / news – We have been very clear to the municipalities, the health organizations and those who run the hospitals that they must focus on full, own positions. We see a positive development there, says Vestre. Organizing in a new way In Fredrikstad, they have initiated measures to reduce the use of temporary workers and hiring from agencies. Health manager Janka Ekrem Holstad believes that it will work over time. – We work actively to give the employees more flexible working hours and look at the distribution of tasks. We are in the process of establishing nursing teams and healthcare teams, so that they can work more together and ensure that they do what they have the right skills for. In addition, they want to have service employees and pharmacy technicians at work who can solve tasks that the nurses and healthcare professionals do not have to do. – What about increasing basic staffing, as the Trade Union and the government want? – We now offer all nurses 100 per cent employment from the start. Then we have a temporary staff pool of 140 employees who are distributed where there is sick leave. But in addition, there is an even greater need that we have to cover by renting, explains Holstad. The mobile controls everyday life The municipality cooperates well with the local trade union to staff the health sector as best as possible. But the main shop steward and deputy chairman Pål Andreas Hauge Christiansen of the Trade Union in Fredrikstad is upset about what he calls casual work and exploitation of health workers – Many chase guards and have an employment contract in the form of a mobile phone. That is not what we are going to offer the healthcare workers of the future, emphasizes Christiansen. Chief union representative Pål Andreas Hauge Christiansen supports Mandy in her fight to get a full position as a health worker in Fredrikstad. Photo: Jan Kenneth Bråten / news For Mandy Hommen, it has been a struggle to get where she is today. She is unsure whether she would have chosen the profession again, even though she finds the workplace fantastic. – I had hoped that it would go well to get a full-time position as long as I am young and healthy. If someone had been honest and told me how it would be, I might have chosen a different profession, she says. Hello and thanks for reading the whole thing! Do you have tips or suggestions for things we should make? Please send me an email. Published 22.08.2024, at 21.35
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The trade union wants fewer temporary workers in the health sector – news Østfold – Local news, TV and radio
