Co. Hospital faces New Year threat

December 1982

Wexford Co. Hospital may be faced with major disruption in the New Year if a threatened trade union dispute at the Fever Hospital in New Ross extends to other hospitals in the county.

An official of the Irish Transport and General Workers Union warned this week that pickets could be placed on the hospital if the dispute escalates.

Such action would amost certainly cause serious problems at Wexford Hospital.

A strike now seems unavoidable at the Fever Hospital in New Ross, where the South-Eastern Health Board plans to convert a staff residential unit into a fever unit for patients.

The I.T. and G.W.U. have up to thirty members living in the residential unit, some of who have been there for up to eighteen years, and they have been given just until the end of the month to move.

‘We have told them not to move. And if they are evicted, we will have to take strike action,’ said branch secretary, Tommy Carr, this week.

And, he added: ‘We are expecting a court order in the New Year. When it arrives, we will be in dispute. We are going to fight these evictions, as our members have not been offered alternative accommodation.’

Mr Carr went on to say that he could give no guarantee that the pickets would not be extended to Wexford Co. Hospital and perhaps also to other hospitals in the county.

‘If circumstances warrant it, we will extend the strike. We feel that strongly about the issue. There could certainly be pickets placed on the Co. Hospital in the New Year,’ he said.