Page 27 - Paul Pace News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Updated 7.20pm, adds Chamber of Commerce reaction The government and the nurses' union have reached an agreement that will reduce bureaucracy for foreign nurses and their immediate family by increasing the validity of their residence permit to three years.  The government is also pledging to process the residency application within 15 working days and has substantially cut the costs linked to the permit. RELATED STORIES Identity Malta bureaucracy has been cited as one of the main reasons why some 140 nurses, equivalent to over a fifth of the nurses who are third-country nationals working her...

The government must act to address the latest record-breaking spike in new COVID-19 cases, the nurses union said on Tuesday, warning a lockdown could soon be the only solution.  "The government is taking things too lightly. Yes, a lockdown should be used as a last resort but the way things are heading, we're soon reaching that point," Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses (MUMN) head Paul Pace said. The government has resisted calls for a lockdown, insisting this would be futile and that measures in place are enough to keep the situation under control. Health Minister Chris Fearne also previous...

A judge has temporarily suspended industrial action ordered by the UĦM Voice of the Workers union in hospital following an application for an injunction filed by the health ministry.  Last week the union directed 1,300 healthcare workers to take industrial action after claims the government had backtracked on previous pledges. The 400 directives affected various departments and sectors, from emergency ambulance responders to radiographers, dental hygienists, physiotherapists and social workers. However, on Thursday evening Mr Justice Grazio Mercieca halted the action until submissions on t...

Directives issued to emergency ambulance workers by the Union Ħaddiema Magħqudin (UĦM) are “illegal” and have badly affected the provision of emerge

Malta frets as foreign nurses head to Britain amid COVID-19 crisis Reuters 2/15/2021 VALLETTA, Feb 15 (Reuters) - Malta's nurses union has warned that its hospitals, hard-pressed by the COVID-19 pandemic, face a staffing crisis as Britain has enticed away a growing number of the island nation's foreign nurses with offers of better pay and conditions. Some 600 third-country national nurses work in Malta, but roughly 150 have moved abroad or else handed in their resignation since December, union sources said. "It is a crisis," the MUMN union said in a statement. Other southern European countr...