HUDDERSFIELD Royal Infirmary (HRI) workers are determined to strike to defeat the closure of their hospital and the privatisation of their jobs. About 380 porters, gardeners, cleaners and maintenance workers have voted 95% in favour of going on strike after being threatened with having their jobs privatised.
It was revealed last month that hospital bosses are intending to set up a new ‘wholly owned subsidiary’ company to employ the staff working in estates and facilities at the infirmary. Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust (CHFT) has said very little about the motivation for the move.
In a statement last December its director responsible said it would help the trust ‘generate income from new sources’. Trade unions have said the plan is merely to help the hospital exploit a VAT loophole for purchasing hospital supplies.
It could also allow them to employ new staff on inferior terms and conditions. They have described the move as ‘privatisation’ and a ‘tax dodge’ and have said the companies could be sold on a later date, losing the staff their NHS pensions, terms and conditions in the process.
Natalie Ratcliffe, Unison regional health organiser, said last week that the union is opposing similar plans at hospitals across West Yorkshire. She said members in Bradford have shown ‘overwhelming support’ for industrial action.
She said: ‘In the main, the staff affected by this plan are the lowest paid employees of the trust, who are already paid below the real living wage. ‘To date, the only comment the trust has been prepared to make to justify their plan is that they wish to become more commercial and generate additional revenue.
‘The directors involved in giving this plan the green light have so far refused to give any further information – not even to their own staff. ‘We believe the only way this plan will generate significant additional revenues is by attacking the terms, conditions and pensions of our members – their own staff.
‘They have stated that this company will recruit staff on “different” terms and conditions.
‘This would create a divided workforce which would destroy teamwork, loyalty and morale, damage their ability to recruit and retain staff, and ultimately drive down the quality of care. ‘These are staff who believe wholeheartedly in the NHS – they deserve their contribution to be valued and recognised as such and not to be exploited by their bosses in an attempt to compensate for years of chronic and systematic government underfunding.
‘Ultimately, this plan will do nothing to protect the NHS, and can only hasten the process of creeping privatisation of the NHS.’ Unison described the plan as ‘privatisation’ and a ‘tax dodge’ as it is thought hospitals are doing it to take advantage of VAT loopholes on the cost of purchasing supplies, such as toilet rolls.
CHFT has so far refused to give a detailed explanation of the motive behind the plan, saying only that it opens up the potential for it to get ‘income from new sources’. Unison has now confirmed that 95% of its members at HRI have backed going on strike to keep their contracts unchanged. A formal ballot for industrial action has not yet happened but the union is using the result of the ‘indicative ballot’ to raise a formal dispute with CHFT.
Dan Wood, Area Organiser for Unison, said their members would no longer be NHS employees if the plan went ahead and he attacked HRI management’s ‘secrecy’ over the proposal. ‘The results of this indicative ballot were not a suprise to us,’ he said.
‘We know staff are extremely angry with the current proposal, and the determination of the trust to ignore them. ‘These are people who believe absolutely in the NHS, and have devoted their lives to working in service.
‘They will not accept being transferred to a private company where their terms and conditions of employment – including their pensions – could be affected. ‘This will create a two-tier workforce, which would allow for future attacks on staff’s terms and conditions, damage morale, and drive down standards.
‘Of course we sympathise that CHFT is not immune to the damage being done to the NHS by chronic and systematic government underfunding, but it is simply not right to shake down your own loyal staff to plug this funding gap. ‘The trust has not been able to offer any explanation to us as to why they are acting with such haste and secrecy on this issue.’
• The #HandsOffHRI Campaign is fighting to save Huddersfield Royal Infirmary, its 400 beds, its Emergency Care Unit and its Acute Services. Greater Huddersfield is a population area of 250,000 people.
The local CCGs and the NHS Foundation Trust (CHFT) are actively pursuing plans which threaten to demolish the existing 400-bed hospital, sell the land owned by the hospital and build a 64-bed day clinic across the road on rented land – and without a full A&E. Hands Off HRI says: ‘This is not a Done Deal!’
‘The campaign works locally on behalf of the medical staff, the hospital support staff and the people of Greater Huddersfield and Calderdale in West Yorkshire. ‘Hands Off HRI supports other health campaigners across Yorkshire and across the whole of the rest of the United Kingdom.
‘Together, we are united. We can win. And we will.’ The Tory plans are for the current hospital to close and patients needing to use A&E would need to travel to Calderdale Royal Infirmary in Halifax.
• A Valentine’s Day drive through ‘rush hour’ traffic to Calderdale Royal Hospital last week took more than twice as long as hospital chiefs claim it would.
The estimated times were put to the test and found wanting in a race between runners and cars to see who could get to the hospital quickest through busy traffic. The travel times have been a bone of contention in the plans to close HRI and switch its A&E and acute services to Calderdale Royal Hospital.
Health chiefs claim the average road journey for Huddersfield people to Calderdale Royal Hospital would be 21 minutes. However, in the teatime test last week teams of runners took on three cars to see who would get there fastest. The cars all won, but the car times were, to say the least, disappointingly long.
Pairs of runners set off from Holmfirth and from Huddersfield Royal Infirmary on their way to Calderdale Royal Hospital. More than 50 runners took part in the relay race which was supported by the Let’s Save HRI campaign group.
The 4.15pm Holmfirth car took 46 minutes and the runners 69 minutes. The 4.30pm car from Holmfirth took almost 49 minutes and the runners 87. The car from HRI took 23 minutes and the runners 44 minutes for the five-mile journey.
Former marathon runner Sean Doyle, 50, of Brockholes, who helped to organise the event, said the exercise proved the point that the estimated journey times are, as he said, ‘a farce’. He said: ‘The traffic was extremely light, especially on the Calderdale side. But, as we all know, that can change and it’s usually heavier in a morning. But even though the traffic was not too bad the journey times from Holmfirth were double the estimated ones in the hospital plan.’ He added that even blue light ambulances struggle to get through.
‘They may weave as best they can but they can’t fly over cars,’ he said. ‘What we have shown tonight is a moral victory. We have proved a point and the Independent Review Panel should bear this in mind.’ Supporters at the event included Holmfirth Harriers, Stadium Runners, Stainland Lions, Acre Street Runners and Park Run participants.
Sean said the Valentine’s theme was about ‘loving your hospital’ and was part of the campaign to prevent the removal of A&E services at HRI. Sean, who hit the headlines in 2013 when he suffered a cardiac arrest ahead of the Huddersfield Park Run, carried the baton in wave one.
