Court temporarily blocks industrial action by unions at MDH cardiac unit
MUMN says nurses not allowed to make use of their leave entitlement
Updated 5.26pm with Health Ministry statement
The nurses' union has slammed the government's decision to ask a court to halt its industrial action over leave entitlement at Mater Dei Hospital’s cardiac catheterisation suite.
On Wednesday the court provisionally upheld a prohibitory injunction by the health ministry, temporarily halting Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses directives.
The ministry is arguing that the industrial action puts patients' lives at risk. It told court that directives by the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses for staff at the department to refuse working on elective cases as of December 4 would lead to the cancellation of procedures to the serious detriment of patients.
Court will decide whether MUMN can go ahead with industrial action over the leave entitlement of nurses at the cath suite on December 12.
In a statement on Thursday evening, the Ministry for Health said the MUMN's direction was "totally and impulsively disproportionate to the matter in issue", accusing the union of refusing to attend a reconciliation meeting with higher management.
As the directive puts the life of patients in grave jeopardy, the Ministry finds MUMN’s course of action to be disproportionate, unethical and unsafe," the ministry said.
On Thursday, the MUMN said it had only sought to defend the rights of nurses who have been deprived of their leave entitlement, following what it described as a clear breach of the 20% rule.
MUMN explained that this rule - in use at all local hospitals and health centres - regulated the number of employees allowed to take vacation leave simultaneously.
It said MDH management has instead restricted vacation leave at the suite to only one nurse per day. This means that a second nurse who needs to take leave on the same day would have to seek a replacement herself from a cohort of already burned-out nurses.
This effectively made it impossible for the 18 nurses at the department to avail themselves of their accrued leave, and, as things stand, more than 1,500 hours of vacation leave have become inaccessible to staff, it added.
MUMN also lamented what it called "unjust treatment" of a highly experienced charge nurse with 30 years of service in the cath suite, who was previously allowed to approve two nurses on leave without requiring replacement.
"This individual was abruptly stripped of this authority and subjected to humiliation, while a newly appointed charge nurse - still on probation - began enforcing the new restrictive replacement policy, acting against the interests of the nursing staff."
Nurses could take leave without the need for replacements up until three months ago, and according to MUMN, this practice never disrupted the functioning of the unit.
When the union raised the issue with the hospital's management, it was reassured that the 20% would be reinstated soon. This was also confirmed by the nursing director on Thursday. However, the union said this never materialised, and so, it issued a formal dispute (with no directives) to allow management time to resolve the issue.
It claimed it was the health ministry, if not the minister himself, who overruled the decision of the director of nursing "with the sole intention to take MUMN to court".
"MUMN strongly condemns the repeated use of 'patient lives' as a tactic in court to justify the deprivation of nurses’ fundamental right to vacation leave.
"Exploiting patients to avoid addressing illegal or abusive management practices is unacceptable and unethical. It has now become standard practice for MDH management to resort to court action against MUMN rather than correcting their own administrative failings," the union said.
"These legal manoeuvres serve only one purpose: to deprive nurses of their rights and silence legitimate union representation. The irony is striking. While the health ministry, MDH management and its legal advisers prepare to enjoy their own vacation leave and Christmas festivities - without any requirement to find replacements for their vacation leave - the nurses of the cath suite remain bound by a court order preventing them from exercising their right to leave."