Support for striking Health Care workers

Derry City and Strabane District councillor, Maeve O'Neill (People Before Profit) said she was "standing in full solidarity with all our health and social care workers taking to picket lines again on Friday and Monday to reject insulting Tory pay cuts".

Cllr O'Neill said the social care workers were "challenging the inaction of the Secretary of State".

She added: "The DUP cynically rant and rave about the North being treated differently from Britain, but they couldn't care less about NHS workers here being treated differently. There's nothing being offered to workers here but the DUP and Secretary of State are united in not caring. 

"The Tories have been forced to shift on their 'no negotiations on pay' stance but their offer still falls way short of what workers deserve and way below inflation. Strike action is making the difference. Resistance has shifted the political landscape. 

"The message of no more Tory pay cuts needs to be heard by the main Stormont parties too. All five of them voted to impose the disgraceful Tory pay insult instead of backing the resistance against it.  As a healthcare worker and trade union member, I know what my colleagues face everyday and the pressures on the health service because of health profiteering and privatisation. 

"I'm urging everyone to get behind the strikers. This is a fight for fair pay but it's also to save the health service on which we depend."