NURSING AND MIDWIFERY students took part in major protests outside the Department of Health this afternoon, demonstrating against proposals that would sees final year students losing the pay they receive for time on placement.

The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, which organised the rally, said it could control a potential block of up to 200,000 votes – which could have a pivotal outcome in the next general election, RTÉ reports.

INMO general secretary Liam Doran said the plan to phase out the payments made to final year nursing students – who spend up to nine months on placement – as “draconian, unfair and savage”.

He urged student nurses to tell their outgoing TDs that they would not vote for them unless they promised to seek a reversal of the proposed cuts, the Irish Times adds.

About 3,000 attended today’s demonstration, outside the Department of Health headquarters on Hawkins Street in Dublin.

Security staff at the Department were forced to padlock the gates around the building, PA adds, while senior staff quickly left for their lunch breaks before the protest began in earnest, as midwives and students arrived with a letter asking the next Minister to reverse the proposals.

The HSE has backed the INTO in the dispute. Tánaiste Mary Coughlan – who currently holds the health portfolio in the slimmed-down outgoing cabinet – has already asked the Department to review the plan.