Whistleblower suspended - Patients wait

IT’S almost a year since legislation — the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 — to protect whistleblowers came into force but it seems the spirit of that legislation has yet to have as positive an impact it might.

Des McSweeney, a psychiatric nurse in South Lee Mental Health Services and a Siptu shop steward, wrote a piece for this paper in which he expressed concerns about a new €15m acute psychiatric unit at Cork University Hospital.

Mr McSweeney has been told by the HSE that he had “engaged [with the media] in a manner which is inconsistent with the aforementioned policies and procedures” and that he had been placed “off duty with pay”. This is hardly a celebration of transparency and seems designed to dissuade rather than embrace a policy of openness and honesty.

That a badly needed facility stands idle and those who might benefit from it must wait while the health service and unions resolve their differences just adds to the sense that far too many aspects of how our health service goes about its business are not fit for purpose.

DISCOVER MORE CONTENT LIKE THIS