Nurses claim intimidation over protests
The Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) said it had lodged a formal complaint with Kevin Kelly, acting chief executive officer of the Health Service Executive (HSE).
INO general secretary Liam Doran said certain hospital management had sought to intimidate nursing staff into not giving media interviews or participating in the hospital lunchtime protests on overcrowding in A&E wards.
Mr Doran said: "This is old-fashioned intimidation where hospital management remain more anxious to avoid local embarrassment rather than admit, openly and honestly, the scale of the problem."
The INO said it had called upon the HSE to inform all hospitals that elected representatives of any staff group should be allowed to speak out, providing they are not talking about individual patients.
Mr Doran added: "The INO will not have its representatives silenced when they are simply speaking up for the protection of patients, the maintenance of standards and the right for everyone to have a quality- assured health service."
The INO said it was aware of incidents when certain hospital managers had advised staff in "subtle ways" that the hospital's, or staff members', best interests would not be best served by highlighting the situation or holding the protests.
Mr Doran claimed the problem was at particular Dublin hospitals, and alleged that some managements were attempting to stop the staff identifying the particular medical facility.
The INO said in the letter to Mr Kelly it had pointed out consultant staff were free to give interviews, and identify their workplace. Mr Doran claimed the INO had previously experienced similar difficulties and wrote to the health service management last July.
Yesterday, former Health Minister Michael Noonan and Labour's Education spokesperson Jan O'Sullivan joined nurses protesting at the Midwestern Regional Hospital in Limerick.
Mary Fogarty of the INO said: "We cannot tolerate working in these conditions any more. Every Tuesday and Thursday there are up to 20 people on trolleys."
She said they were protesting to protect the interests of people who spend long periods on trolleys.
A spokesman for the Health Services Executive (Mid-West) said the protest did not affect hospital services as nurses were not taken off ward duties.
Ms O'Sullivan said despite a strong economy over the last decade, the Government neglected healthcare.
She said: "I fully support the protests by the INO and all those individual nurses who are out on the protest today, and those who can't be here, because they are inside the hospital working in overcrowded, uncomfortable and often unsafe conditions trying to care for their patients in the best possible way."
