{"id":28822,"date":"2021-05-04T13:33:46","date_gmt":"2021-05-04T12:33:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=28822"},"modified":"2021-05-04T15:45:50","modified_gmt":"2021-05-04T14:45:50","slug":"dudley-hospital-covid-risk-shame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=28822","title":{"rendered":"Dudley Hospital Covid risk shame"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>Unite is warning because of systematic failures by outsourcing giant Mitie, which holds the facility management contract for the NHS Dudley Hospital Trust, staff and patients could be exposed to Covid-19.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In a rare and unusual step the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has issued a notice of contravention on the company in relation to Covid safety. Rather than close the facility the HSE has given Mitie time to improve its Covid procedures.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Unite has described Mitie as running a\u00c2\u00a0\u00e2\u20ac\u0098laissez faire\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00c2\u00a0regime with regards to Covid security at its headquarters at the Russells Hall hospital. The facility management staff are not confined to the headquarters but work throughout all Dudley Group hospital buildings, greatly increasing concerns about Covid security.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Unite has identified a number of major concerns with Mitie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s practises including: social distancing being non-existent, a lack of ventilation, a failure to require staff and visitors to sign in, a lack of security about who can enter the building and a failure to provide hand sanitiser.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Unite believes that Mitie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s approach to Covid security is simply to require staff to wear masks and to have regular lateral flow tests.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Unite, which represents workers on the facility management contract, has raised its concerns directly with the management of both the company and the trust.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>\u00e2\u20ac\u0098One of the worst workplaces I have attended\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis is one of the worst workplaces I have attended as a union officer since the beginning of the pandemic,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 commented Unite regional officer Su Lowe.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite welcomes the intervention of the HSE, but this should never have been necessary, this is a large well-resourced company and strict Covid secure policies and practices should have been in place for well over a year.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bKeeping our NHS staff and patients safe should be the first thought of every company working for the NHS.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe staff working for Mitie, operate throughout the entire Dudley Group of hospitals and any safety breaches will have implications for all of the workers and the public who use the Trust\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s facilities.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite will always speak out to ensure the health and safety of workers, we will continue to hold management\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s feet to the fire, if we don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t who will.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The facility management contract was previously operated by Interserve but was recently acquired by Mitie.<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>By Barckley Sumner<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unite is warning because of systematic failures by outsourcing giant Mitie, which holds the facility management contract for the NHS Dudley Hospital Trust, staff and patients could be exposed to Covid-19.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20367,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[1295,290,1069,647,252],"wps_subtitle":"Unite warns staff and patients could be at risk from Mitie failures","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28822"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28822"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28824,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28822\/revisions\/28824"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}