Mr. Paul Bell:

It would be easy for trade union officials to say everything wrong with staffing issues or practices is the fault of HR managers. In voluntary section 38 hospitals, the management is close to the staff. It is not a large geographic spread. I refer to hospitals such as St. Vincent's University Hospital, with which the Deputy will be familiar. Sometimes issues can be resolved more quickly or staff matters can be attended to on the basis that it is closer to the staff member. While we do not want to generalise because it would be unfair, given that we view the HSE as a national organisation, it should deal with issues concerning staff consistently across the board, whether it is a grievance, a policy on dignity and respect at work or whatever it is.

Sometimes, however, we have found that our union gets into difficult positions where some HR managers decide there will be a regional variation of a national policy. That makes us engage on issues where we have agreed the policy at national level, how the staff members should be cared for and the employer's rights, but in cases of grievance resolution, for example, one may find that one set of hospitals in the north east will comply with policy set down nationally by the HSE corporate employee system, whereas in Cork it may not be interpreted that way. We then have to jump through hoops to try to have the matter resolved. That leads to bad industrial relations and tensions in the system, which does not need more tensions. It leads to difficulties.