Nurses hit back at Harney’s ‘ransom’ remarks

NURSES hit back at the Health Minster Mary Harney yesterday after she accused them of holding the Government to ransom in a staffing row which has seen a €5 million emergency department lie idle for more than a year.

Mary Dunnion, the director of nursing at Cork’s Mercy University Hospital (MUH), said they are anxious to move into the new facility but insisted that extra staff are needed.

She was responding to comments from Ms Harney who effectively blamed MUH staff for the unused 756sq metre facility which was finished in January 2007.