Nursing home reports should be fair and transparent

THE Irish Nursing Homes Organisation fully supports the expansion and enhancement of the current inspection regime concerning nursing homes. However, the current HSE inspection system is totally unfair and deprives nursing home proprietors of any degree of natural justice whatsoever.

There is no consistency of application, inspectors are not trained and there is no uniformity in their approach or the style of their reports.

The policy is a breach of fair procedures and constitutional justice in that any response to a report provided by the particular nursing home is omitted from the HSE website. This deprives the nursing home of a right of reply.