Fascinating social history
I was asked to review this by the Nursing Times Journal
What was it like?
The author tells of the dreadful working conditions which made a group of 20 nurses and midwives to gather in South Anne St, Dublin, in 1919, where they agreed to formally establish the Irish Nurses' Union. Nurses at the time were earning a pittance compared with men working in industry. Shockingly we learn they were getting meagre food allowances as par payment of their poor salaries. A year earlier women could vote in the UK but women had a long way to go. This book tells the story of the history of the INMO. It gives the reader a fascinating look at just how this union has grown (1925 there were under 800 members through to the present day of approximately 40,000)
What were the highlights?
The fact that this is not just a history book but has in-depth account from real INMO's members and leaders. The author describes the nurse’s protests in the late 70s and who marched on the Dáil (Irish Parliament) and were admitted to the gallery where they put their case to the TDs while the INO's leaders negotiated over tea and cake with the Minister for Health!
The author refers to the treatment of critically ill Mary Madden, the wife of PJ Madden, former INO general secretary, during the nurses' strike of 1999, when then INO president Anne Cody tended to Mary during the strike in between picket line duties, as Mrs Madden had been refused home hospice care. That was extremely poignant. Striking when you have patients is extremely controversial but in some ways the reader will ask how could they have moved forward?
There is humour in this book too as the author writes accounts of men seeing the trade union as somewhere to obtain a wife- a farmer stipulated as long as they could milk a cow that was the only credential required! Again, life and the union have moved on.
Strengths & weaknesses:
There were no weaknesses in this book.
We have to thank the author – if it were not for his PHD this story would have been fragmented and needs to reach out to future generations of nurses and midwives so they too can learn from this too and know their backgrounds of nurses at that time will be long gone and their stories being forgotten. He was working shifts in ITU and writing this in between his shifts. was asked to review this by the Nursing Times Journal
What was it like?
The author tells of the dreadful working conditions which made a group of 20 nurses and midwives to gather in South Anne St, Dublin, in 1919, where they agreed to formally establish the Irish Nurses' Union. Nurses at the time were earning a pittance compared with men working in industry. Shockingly we learn they were getting meagre food allowances as par payment of their poor salaries. A year earlier women could vote in the UK but women had a long way to go. This book tells the story of the history of the INMO. It gives the reader a fascinating look at just how this union has grown (1925 there were under 800 members through to the present day of approximately 40,000)
What were the highlights?
The fact that this is not just a history book but has in-depth account from real INMO's members and leaders. The author describes the nurse’s protests in the late 70s and who marched on the Dáil (Irish Parliament) and were admitted to the gallery where they put their case to the TDs while the INO's leaders negotiated over tea and cake with the Minister for Health!
The author refers to the treatment of critically ill Mary Madden, the wife of PJ Madden, former INO general secretary, during the nurses' strike of 1999, when then INO president Anne Cody tended to Mary during the strike in between picket line duties, as Mrs Madden had been refused home hospice care. That was extremely poignant. Striking when you have patients is extremely controversial but in some ways the reader will ask how could they have moved forward?
There is humour in this book too as the author writes accounts of men seeing the trade union as somewhere to obtain a wife- a farmer stipulated as long as they could milk a cow that was the only credential required! Again, life and the union have moved on.
Strengths & weaknesses:
There were no weaknesses in this book.
We have to thank the author – if it were not for his PHD this story would have been fragmented and needs to reach out to future generations of nurses and midwives so they too can learn from this too and know their backgrounds of nurses at that time will be long gone and their stories being forgotten. He was working shifts in ITU and writing this in between his shifts.
The amount of research that went into this author writing is a credit to him.
The photographs within the book make this real to the reader.
A recommended interesting social history of a nurse’s union
Who should read it?
This book must be on all student nurses and midwives reading list nurses today must be told of this and realise what our forebears did this is social history which needs to be told and not be forgotten
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