Jubilee blues for Pennine Acute staff

Rochdale hospital staff have been told that the Royal Jubilee will be treated like any other day for staff rostered to be on duty and they will not be paid extra duty payments but would receive an additional day’s holiday in lieu.

At yesterday’s Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust Board meeting, trade unions asked for the day to be regarded as a Bank Holiday, in keeping with other Trusts including Central Manchester. Liz McInnes of Unite said: “This would be a great morale-booster for staff. I would like to remind the Board that this Trust recently received a sharp indication of the morale of staff in this Trust in the shape of a staff satisfaction survey which revealed Pennine Acute to be in the bottom 20% nationally on almost all issues.

“This Trust recently had a golden opportunity to improve the morale of staff and to show them that their work is valued, by treating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee on 5 June as a true Bank Holiday with staff rostered to work that day receiving full bank holiday remuneration. This would be in keeping with the approach taken by our neighbouring Trust, Central Manchester Foundation Trust.

“Instead, and despite repeated requests from staff, this Trust has chosen not to treat the day as a Bank Holiday. The precedent was set with the Royal Wedding Day last year but we have consistently argued that the celebration of 60 years on the Throne is of far more national significance to Pennine staff and to the general public and should be afforded the respect it deserves.”

She went on to say that the staff are disappointed that the Management have taken this approach: “We do not believe that paying Bank Holiday rates would be a significant amount and we feel that the improvement in staff morale as a result would more than outweigh any financial outlay. Do the Chair and members of the Trust Board have any views or comments on this which they would like to share with the staff?”

The Chairman, John Jesky replied that the request had been considered by the Executive Team but the decision remained unchanged and was in keeping with last year’s decision regarding the Royal Wedding. Roger Pickering, Director of Human Resources for the Trust confirmed the decision. He said that other surrounding NHS Trusts such as Bolton, Stockport, South Manchester and Wigan, Leigh and Wrightington were making similar arrangements to Pennine.

Later in the meeting, CEO John Saxby said that the Trust was engaging with a company called ‘Optimise’ who specialised in staff engagement through a project called ‘Listening into Action’. It was hoped that this would go some way towards addressing some of the issues picked up in the staff attitude survey which had placed the Trust in the bottom 20 per cent of NHS organisations in the country.