Midwives in Cork are due to meet tonight to consider the latest Health Service Executive (HSE) proposals aimed at resolving the dispute that threatens the rescheduled opening of the new €75 million Cork University Maternity Hospital.
While the HSE and the Irish Nurses' Organisation (INO) failed to disclose exact details yesterday, it is hoped the HSE proposal regarding the build up of staff levels at the new hospital over the next eight weeks will address staffing concernsand lead to its opening on Saturday.
An earlier proposal that would see the HSE open 128 beds at the 144-bed hospital, with an initial staff complement of 315 midwives and nurses, was recommended by the INO's negotiators for acceptance.However, midwives voted to overwhelmingly reject this proposal last Friday.That rejection led to the deferral of the opening of the hospital last Saturday.
Both sides have been in regular contact this week in a bid to reach agreement on how the HSE can ramp up numbers of midwives and nurses to the 375 figure recommended by the Labour Court.
INO general secretary Liam Doran, who will travel to Cork for tonight's meeting at the Rochestown Park Hotel, said that midwives had concerns about relying on working overtime to provide proper cover, a practice that had been criticised in a recent report on the workings of the maternity unit at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda.
Assistant National Director of Human Resources HSE South,Barry O'Brien said that he was greatly encouraged by the response of midwives to induction courses at Cork University Maternity Hospital with over 300 attending to date for orientation programmes at the new hospital."I think it's a great tribute to the midwives that over 300 of them have attended these programmes while at the same time managing to provide a day-to-day service in the existing hospitals at the Erinville, St Finbarr's and the Bons Secours," he said.