Alicante Nursing Assistants Demand Pay Rise: "We Are Undervalued and Taking on Tasks That Aren't Ours"

Técnicos en Cuidados Auxiliares de Enfermería have taken to the streets this Friday outside healthcare centres across the country exercising their right to strike for salary increases. One of the epicentres of the protest in the province of Alicante was the General Hospital Dr. Balmis, where dozens of these professionals gathered to demand their professional reclassification to group C1, a long-standing demand.

TCAE Nuria Flores has emerged as one of the spokespersons for the protest in front of the Alicante hospital, where she quantified what this lack of professional recognition means: "The monthly economic loss can be around 200 or 300 euros," an amount that, she emphasises, "is a lot of money for the work we TCAE do." The protest was supported by the Union Sindical Obrera (FAC-USO), responsible for registering the strike call.

The healthcare worker claims that the group takes on functions far beyond what their professional category dictates. "We do nursing work, our own work, and at the rate we're going, sometimes even doctors' work," she states. She further explains that they are the ones who spend the most time with patients: "We are the first to enter, perform hygiene, are there when they have a hard time, and calm the family."

Meanwhile, she says, other roles perform much shorter interventions: "The nurse comes in, gives the medication, and that's it. The doctor comes for five minutes, assesses, and leaves."

Flores also details some tasks that, she asserts, have been added to their responsibilities without justification: "We are the ones who feed, change diapers, monitor urine output, temperature, and even drains." The result, she denounces, is a high workload: "We work tirelessly. We are not valued and have many tasks that do not belong to us, but we do them because there is no other choice."

Flores emphasises that the training of TCAE does not correspond with this classification: "I have a vocational training course. In vocational training, both intermediate and higher degrees correspond to a C1. And we remain in C2, which is a comparative grievance compared to other professions."