ATTEMPTS BY Rostrevor nursing home in Rathgar, Dublin to stop residents being moved out of the facility by the Health Service Executive failed in court yesterday.
The HSE took charge of the home after the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) obtained an interim order in the District Court effectively shutting it down. The HSE is trying to find alternative placements for the residents.
Gavin Ralston SC, for the home, told Circuit Court President Mr Justice Matthew Deery his clients were anxious that residents not be moved on the basis of an interim court order granted on foot of an ex-parte application.
There were residents who had expressed a desire to remain there, he added.
He also submitted that the District Court “went too far” in making the order directing the HSE to make alternative arrangements for residents.
Eoin McCullough SC, for Hiqa, said the circuit court did not have jurisdiction to deal with the application brought before it by the home.
He said an interim order had been made by the District Court and the matter would be back before that court next week or the week after for a final order, and that was the time for the home to set out its case.
An appeal could only be brought to the Circuit Court once a final determination had been made by the District Court.
He also said it was impossible to see how one could complain about the HSE doing something it was statutorily obliged to do, which was to take charge of the home and make alternative arrangements for residents, once the interim order had been granted.
The only evidence before the court, he said, was an affidavit from the authority which raised extremely serious concerns about the management of the home as well as serious allegations of elder abuse of a physical and verbal nature.
It also recounted prior HSE proceedings in relation to the home which resulted in fines being levied in 2005 for breaches of care and welfare regulations as well as the fact that the name of Therese Lipsett, the registered provider of care at the home, had been erased from the nurses register after an inquiry by An Bord Altranais.
Notwithstanding that, “she still appears to play some part in the management of the home.
He added that Mr Ralston’s submission that some residents expressed a desire to remain in the home was not evidence.