Up to 170 nursing staff at a psychiatric hospital in Clonmel will begin industrial action today in a row over what they claim is their employer's failure to properly investigate allegations against a senior member of staff.
The nurses will report for work at St Luke's Hospital today but will only be available to provide emergency care to patients.
Their union, the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA), said last night the move was in protest at the the former South Eastern Health Board's failure to provide them with a safe working environment.
Mr Des Kavanagh, general secretary of the PNA, said a number of complaints had been made against a senior staff member. His members believed the complaints were not properly investigated and there should be a full inquiry before this person returned to work in a supervisory capacity.
The PNA advised management that the staff member's return is inadvisable and unacceptable without the complaints being formally investigated.
The union points out that the nationally agreed policy, Dignity at Work, provides for investigation as the next step where mediation or facilitation has failed to resolve the issue. This should take place before the return to work, he said. He added that last minute talks failed to resolve the issue on Friday.
A PNA delegation will travel to the headquarters of the newly established Health Service Executive (HSE) in Naas today to hand in a letter to its acting chief executive, Mr Kevin Kelly, requesting his intervention in the dispute.
A spokeswoman for the former South Eastern Health Board (SEHB), now referred to as the Health Service Executive South East region, expressed surprise at the PNA's action.
"The HSE South East region is surprised and very disappointed that this action is being taken, particularly as there has been an independently agreed process in place for resolution of issues at St Luke's for the past 18 months," she said.
Mr Kavanagh said nurses had been making representations about "the extremely stressful working environment" in the hospital for some time.
"A crisis point was reached in 2003 culminating in a joint referral of the issues to the LRC. Following a conciliation conference in March 2003, an agreed document was produced . . . in which the SEHB acknowledged representations made to it by the PNA about the way nurse-management in the hospital is conducted and how that style affects the well-being, morale, working lives and careers of members on an ongoing basis," he said.
"The document set out that this serious issue should be dealt with by facilitation/mediation/ investigation," he added.
Mr Kavanagh claimed this process was not followed. Furthermore, he said the PNA was prepared to compromise and would accept the manager's return to work if it was ensured that for three months while the complaints were being investigated the manager would not have a direct role with staff. This was rejected.
"It is as if the employers want a dispute," he said. St Luke's Hospital is a psychiatric unit with 168 beds. In addition to providing acute and long stay care, it provides respite care, outpatient and addiction counselling services.