Lower Hunter Sector / New Maitland Hospital Disputes Update
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Published February 2, 2022
Unfortunately, despite HSU members raising many serious safety and practical issues, HNELHD continues to push for numerous unreasonable aspects of its proposed restructures and changes to be implemented, including:
- Significantly increasing the scope and content of the work of Administrative employees with no increase in staffing;
- Grossly understaffing Security, despite its own internal risk assessment recommending significantly increasing Security Officer positions; and
- Deleting jobs in Maintenance, including the jobs of two gardeners, despite there being no apparent decrease in work and requiring employees to work across multiple sites.
If HNELHD’s changes are not amended, they are likely to increase the already high workloads of staff across the Lower Hunter Sector and will put members at risk of physical and psychological injury.
The HSU has taken HNELHD to the NSW Industrial Relations Commission, alleging that HNELHD has failed to comply with its Award obligations by:
- Refusing to provide the HSU and its members all relevant information about the proposed restructures and changes;
- Misrepresenting the content of documents used to justify the proposed restructures and changes; and
- Failing to consider and properly respond to the HSU and its members’ concerns.
The HSU will continue to push for HNELHD to genuinely consult with members and make reasonable amendments to its proposals through whatever means are available.