This article is from page 8 of the 2014-06-24 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 8 JPG
MORE than 90 per cent of staff at Ennis General Hospital have voted to begin industrial action which could begin in as little as seven days.
The IMPACT trade union held the ballot at Ennis and other hospitals in the Limerick Hospital Group on Friday in response to the revelation that the HSE paid one of its local managers € 258,000, on a contract bases over a 13-month period.
The union claims that this role was previously carried out by a salaried staff member in the HSE who earning about € 80,000 per annum.
IMPACT will now bring the results of the ballot to the HSE and will begin industrial action within seven days if no agreement can be reached.
The industrial action will include a suspension of all contact between members of the IMPACT union and the manager in question but will not at this time include any withdrawal of work.
“The ballot was passed by about 90 per cent. I’m not surprised, I’ve rarely seen people this annoyed about a local issue within the hospital group,” said Andy Pike, IMPACT rep for Ennis General Hospital.
“Once notice of industrial action is served, no union member will taking instruction from that persons [the contracted manager], we wont be providing any information to that person or we wont be reporting to him.
“We are concerned that any form of industrial action that we undertake would not detrimentally effect patient services so this will be an inconvenience for people in the hospital group but it will not effect hospital services. “We plan to contact the HSE at national level and give them another chance to tell us when the contact with the individual will end. “If we get a satisfactory response to that engagement then the prob- lem can be solved. But if they still refuse to even inform staff when the contract is due to end then we will serve notice and the action will begin within seven days. “We think it is responsible to give the HSE another chance.” The contractor is paid in the region of € 700 a day – which amount to more than the total yearly salary paid to HSE secretary general Tony O’Brien.