Beware the Wounded Dragon

Dear Team and Friends,

As you know they have indicated they are willing to negotiate if we lift our protected industrial action.

A few things to note:

v  Your delegates have been in negotiations with them for a very prolonged period before the present circumstances. The outcome was so dismal despite the VHPA and your delegate’s best efforts that it drove us into the present circumstance. (No need to repeat the details here) These actions go against our whole being and soul, we did not enter into the helping professions to engage in industrial action, we are co-operative people by inclination and training.

v  Having said that it is with great gusto that the membership and friends have entered into the Protected Action showing the degree of frustration in the various work places at this time.

v  The VHPA and your delegates have agreed to drop all but the minor actions and to enter into negotiations with the proviso that the actions will be reinstated if the delegates believe negotiations are not progressing satisfactorily. Also of course the locked out people must be reinstated.

v  Note:    They can reinstate the “locked out” people at any time they only have to pick up the pen and say “come back.” Cruelly they are still using the “locked out” people as pawns in their game of intimidation and bullying with all the implications for the “locked outs” wellbeing, health, finances, career, and family that this implies.

v  The VHPA and your delegates have kept in constant communication with the “Locked Out”. We have been proactive in their welfare and of course there are fund raisers running. The common feeling is being in a state of Limbo with the uncertainty and the implications that it implies. They also greatly miss their friends, colleagues and work mates.

Locked Out John, An, Christian, Gerard with VHPA's Craig, Linda and Delegate Mathew.

 

The “locked out” as you know consist of 2 of your delegates and four employees apparently chosen at random a few things to note here:

ü  The four randomly selected have a couple of things in common:

·         They are some of the best of the best –they are all very competent and dedicated a few recent arrivals but one who has spent most of her working life at this place.

ü  The two delegates differ in that one is like the midday sun, strong vibrant  full of a burning energy. The other is a setting sun a consistent and constant burn. But they both have a passion for their jobs, their fellow workers and for their work places. Ironically they were doing a service for their employer in providing a conduit and safety valve of communication for them and their staff.

ü  All have and are willing to bear the burden for you. All have paid a huge price for having the Moral Courage to stand up. Some are doing better than others but that is the way of it.

 

Thank you again for all your efforts keep at it. Remember your fellow workers who man the reception desks, phones and who wheel the trolleys are bearing many of the unpleasant side effects of this Protected Action. Let us hope that this will all be behind us soon and we can do our work in peace and with gusto in the kind of work place that is a pleasure to be at. And with an employer who really cares for us and not only visits us to issue threats, ultimatums or Lock Out notices.

 

There is an old Chinese proverb: “Beware the wounded dragon”

Locked Out Delegate Scott

 

The dragon that has been unleashed at this time is indeed wounded, dangerous and unpredictable let us hope that he will not do to much more damage to either side. Why cannot we be generous and magnanimous to each other, we will all gain and our world and our circumstances will all be the better and stronger for it.

 

John Condliffe

Your VHPA delegate

20.3.14

 

John Condliffe is a VHPA delegate at a large private radiology service in a large public hospital in Melbourne.