Strike action looms at QEH

THE National Union of Public Workers (NUPW) says that industrial action is looming at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH).And the union has hinted that by next week it may not be business as usual at the hospital.According to acting deputy general secretary of the NUPW, Roslyn Smith, this was a result of the “tardy response by the QEH management to rectify the breach in the recruitment policy which obtains at the hospital.”Smith said that long-serving temporary staff had been denied work and permanent employment.“New persons are brought on staff and placed in vacant positions while others are rostered every two weeks and the long-serving staff are not offered employment under the guise that the status would remain until the matter is settled with the union,” she said.The NUPW, in a Press release yesterday, said they had not met with the chairman, the board or the human resource committee of the QEH.The union’s view is that all long-serving staff be placed in the vacant positions and those new workers be employed in the short-term slots which arise as a result of vacation/sick/maternity leave.Smith said that on average there would be around 350 places awarded per month that could be divided among the old and new employees.The union says it is not prepared to wait any longer “since its members are the ones who are being disadvantaged”.