Sunday 14 th June 2015
The Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) has agreed to suspend pending industrial action by its members in Roscommon following agreement with the HSE on the establishment of a joint implementation group to address a range of issues in the mental health services in the county.
PNA members in Roscommon had voted overwhelmingly at the end of May for industrial action in response to serious ongoing concerns with a number of aspects of the mental health services in the county which staff said were making it impossible for them to deliver safe and quality services to patients.
Among the key demands of PNA were for agreed core staffing levels for all services across the county including in acute unit, day centres , day hospital ,continuing care of the elderly unit, community teams and CMHN posts. PNA also demanded that ongoing concerns about poor standard of clinical governance across the service be addressed urgently in the interests of patient and staff safety.
Following the PNA vote in favour of industrial action, HSE management invited PNA to talks last Thursday (June 11 th ) and agreed to the establishment of an implementation group to address 21 issues identified by PNA as in need of urgent action in order to ensure the delivery of safe and quality services in Roscommon.
Commenting on the establishment of the joint PNA/HSE implementation body, PNA Western Regional Representative, Breege Callaghan said;
‘PNA welcomes the setting up of this group which will allow for the suspension of the planned industrial action by nurses who felt they had no other option left to them to address the serious problems with staffing, safety and clinical governance in the Roscommon mental health services. We look forward to working with HSE management and will be moving as a matter of urgency to address the 21 issues which PNA has identified as essential to delivering safe, professional and quality mental health services in Roscommon.'
Media Contacts: Breege Callaghan 087-9310827 Derek Cunningham 086-2430535
