(Finance) – News coming for healthcare professionals. Paycheck increases equal, on average, to around 250 euros gross per month and around 10,800 euros gross in arrears. Guaranteed rights over working hours and careers. Specific allowance also for healthcare managers and allowance per shift for services provided in emergency rooms. Professional tasks assigned by companies “no later than 60 days from the positive outcome of the evaluation” and recovery of overtime worked which until now could have been eliminated. This is what the collective labor agreement of the Healthcare Area 2019/21 signed today at Aran which will officially come into force tomorrow.
“The definitive signing of the 2019/21 Medical Management Contract is an important result for the workers of the NHS, but now the negotiations in the companies and the renewal of the three-year period 22/24 are now underway – this was stated in a note Andrea Filippi, national secretary of the Fp Cgil Doctors and NHS Managers –. Rights over working hours and careers are guaranteed. Staff shortages will no longer be able to fall solely on the shoulders of professionals, because the new contract effectively acts as a lever for an extraordinary hiring plan. In fact, to guarantee services, new staff are needed, instead of squeezing out the little that is left. Furthermore, to make the Health Service attractive, it is necessary to intervene on working conditions and on reconciliation with personal and family life. We have improved the possibility of reconciling work-life times also by intervening on the economic conditions of part-time and agile working, but above all we need to hire new professionals. As for salaries, we guarantee the concentration of available resources to increase the fixed and recurring items of the paycheck, with an average gross monthly increase of 240 euros. The arrears accrued from 2019 to today are equal to approximately 10 thousand euros gross per capita which can be paid already in the February/March paycheck. The FP Cgil has fought and will continue to fight for the equal pay of all managers also in reference to the recognition of the exclusivity allowance for managers of the healthcare professions starting from the next contract. Let’s say right now that the Minister must convene the management unions to address the wage and employment issue with tools that are very different from those put in place so far. We are aware that investments and more resources are needed as well as more bargaining, including corporate ones, to recognize the role of those who choose to work for the NHS, with pride and a spirit of service. Now – he concludes – we immediately begin negotiations in companies and the renewal of the 22/24 three-year period”.
“We signed a good contract despite some changes also introduced by well-known ‘little hands’ – say i medical unions Anaao Assomed and Cimo-Fesmed –. The definitive version of the contract presents some changes to some articles previously negotiated with the unions and foreseen in the text signed last September 28th. Changes that go beyond the verification of the compatibility of the planned expenses with the available resources carried out by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. We formally denounced this attitude in a statement on the minutes because it violates the principles of good faith, loyalty and transparency on which trade union relations should be based. Overall, it is a good contract and we thank Aran, President Naddeo and his staff for their collaboration during a negotiation which was nevertheless difficult. Now, in any case, an even more important chapter is opening, namely the integrative bargaining in all the healthcare companies of the NHS, necessary to make many of the innovations introduced in the Ccnl operational, which otherwise risk remaining a dead letter. We do not deny a certain concern because in recent years negotiations in companies have started extremely late and continued very slowly. But the public health crisis does not allow further postponements: we therefore urge all hospital managements to quickly convene union representatives to conclude the decentralized negotiations as soon as possible and improve the working conditions of doctors and healthcare managers who work in public facilities”.
“As CISL, together with the category, we express satisfaction for the signing of the National Collective Labor Agreement for the Healthcare area relating to the three-year period 2019/2021 which will immediately produce positive effects on the regulatory and economic institutions of the 135 thousand medical and healthcare managers – comments the general secretary of the CISL, Luigi Sbarra –. The conclusion of a long and complex negotiation cannot, however, make us forget the difficult situation that the public healthcare system is experiencing. We need further resources and investments in staff, needs that we have been calling for for some time and which we are once again demanding today together with the rapid opening of the table for the renewal of the 2022/2024 contract which has expired for over two years.”
“Great satisfaction and pride for the definitive signature of the 2019-2021 health management collective bargaining agreement, which represents a fundamental step towards the recognition and valorisation of the managerial, medical, veterinary and healthcare staff of our National Health Service. Results that are the result of negotiations long, intense and constructive, which have led to significant improvements in working conditions, in the protection of rights and in the careers of staff. This contract not only improves the quality of working life of professionals in the sector, but will contribute significantly to improve all public health. The sector committee is already working for the next contractual round, starting with the health sector, which affects over half a million workers” states in a note the president of Aran, Antonio Naddeo.
“With the signing of the 2019-2021 employment contract of doctors, veterinarians and healthcare managers, an important result has been achieved for all workers of the National Health Service – states, in a note, the confederal secretary of the CGIL Francesca Re David –. Now we need to quickly open company bargaining and start the renewal of the three-year period 2022 – 2024. We hope that the relaunch of bargaining is at a second level, which at a national level can emphasize the need to safeguard the NHS, starting from a central point: working conditions, as well as obviously wages and rights”.
“Satisfaction with the closure of the 2019-2021 National Collective Labor Agreement for doctors, veterinarians and healthcare managers. It is a good contract, which acts not only on the economic side, but also on working conditions – comments the president of Fnomceo, the National Federation of Orders of Surgeons and Dentists, Filippo Anelli. Among the elements underlined by Anelli is “the recognition of overtime hours above the ceiling, which until now were lost, of the right to rest, the unblocking of careers, the definition of certain rules for the employment of trainees”.
For the Federation, there is now a need for “a further step at a regulatory level to keep doctors within the National Health Service and the need for supplementary negotiations with the opening of negotiations for the 2022-2024 national collective bargaining agreement”. In parallel, a rapid renewal of the Agreement with local medical doctors is also needed, which – he concludes Rings – lead to the strengthening and modernization of local medicine”, concludes Anelli.
(Photo: © Vittaya Sinlapasart/ 123RF)