23 jobs on chopping block at troubled LGH
Employees at Launceston General Hospital have protested at a stop-work action over claims 23 full-time-equivalent positions involving ward clerks and environmental service officers will be axed when additional federal government funding provided during Covid runs out on June 17.
“The sacking of these workers will mean nurses and other health professionals have to pick up the slack and take on duties that we should not expect them to perform,” said Health and Community Services Union state secretary Lucas Digney.
“It could mean cuts to services across medical and surgical wards.
“These positions are vital to the operation of the hospital. Just because the pandemic has been declared over does not mean that there’s been any reduction in demand for health services.
“The Department of Health have asked for additional funding for these positions, but, as it stands, these workers will be sacked in just a matter of weeks if the Premier doesn’t step in to stop it happening.”
Mr Digney said about 40 staff would be affected, should the funding be allowed to run out on June 17. He said that last week’s 2023–24 state budget indicated the tap was about to run dry.
LGH ward clerk and union delegate Elizabeth Dominy said: “We are increasingly anxious about our jobs … but not just our jobs. We know that if we’re let go, the work that we do every day just won’t get done.
“Support workers like us are often left out of the conversation about health, but this place cannot run without us. It’s that simple. Nurses will have to consider closing beds if our positions are not retained.”
Ms Dominy said she was hired to her current role in March last year and that the hospital “definitely cannot run without us”.
She said her role had been “helping doctors and nurses with admin tasks, putting patient notes together, making sure they are correctly collated” and allowing visitors access to the locked wards, which required intercom access that nurses “don’t have time” to answer.
“My contract will not be renewed, as far as I am aware,” she said. “I’m pretty scared. I have enjoyed working on the medical ward.”
Her colleague, Craig Fraser, who is also a ward clerk and was hired one month after Ms Dominy, said he was in the same boat.
“I’ve heard next to nothing. The government has been conspicuous in its silence,” he said.
“I’m very anxious. It’s a bit distressing, you don’t know what you’re doing. I’ll probably go back to the pool office, being on-call all the time, which can be a bit hard for organising life – I look after my elderly mother.
“This has been a really good job and I like the hospital.”
The department was contacted for comment just before 9am on Monday but failed to respond to respond before deadline.