This item was published during the term of a previous administration that ended in April 2007
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New guidelines to protect doctors and nurses
31/01/2003
New Partnership arrangements designed to create the
right conditions for front-line staff to design and drive
reform for the benefit of patients were launched today.
The new Scottish Partnership Forum (SPF) and Human
Resource Forum (HRF) will bring together health employees,
unions, professional organisations and the Scottish
Executive to set policy and implement change. This builds
on a firm foundation of partnership over the last four
years at national and local levels in NHSScotland.
The SPF will now have a new remit, putting workforce
issues at the heart of national policy development by
involving staff at the highest level. In addition, the new
HR Forum is charged with tackling specific human resource
issues that can and should be determined Scotland wide on a
partnership basis.
At the conference, Health Minister Malcolm Chisholm also
launched the Managing Health at Work Guideline, published
by the Partnership Information Network (PIN) Board. The
guidance focuses on the major issues that affect the
wellbeing, health and safety of staff in their every day
working environment, such as stress, lone working,
attendance, violence and aggression, manual handling,
biological and chemical dangers.
Speaking in Edinburgh at the fifth annual National
Partnership Conference, the Minister said:
"The key to service improvement is partnership with
patients and staff. I would like to thank everyone who has
helped develop staff partnership working through the
Scottish Partnership Forum and all the local partnerships
throughout Scotland.
"The SPF has overseen huge changes in the way
NHSScotland works as a partnership, so I am particularly
pleased to announce a new National Framework for
partnership working. The SPF will have a new role - no
longer simply looking at HR issues, it will now be placed
at the heart of national policy and involve staff at all
levels.
"The new HR Forum will cover a difficult and emerging
agenda to ensure that NHS Scotland is an exemplar employer,
ready to develop solutions to the challenges that change
will pose.
"In order to give further assistance and signify the
commitment by the Executive, A Partnership Support Unit
will be set up. It will receive investment to provide the
support and drive at national and local levels, spread good
practice and improve communications to frontline staff.
"The new framework will offer fresh impetus for
partnership working at all levels. All partners must now
jointly develop an agenda visible to frontline staff with
clear outcomes that will move modernisation and reform
forward. We must all work towards reducing bureaucracy and
place great emphasis on implementation at local level
through area partnership forums.
"I would also like to take this opportunity to launch
the new Managing Health at Work PIN Guideline which should
go some way to improving the working environment for NHS
staff. This new guideline has been drafted by the health
service, for the health service and now needs to be
implemented by the health service. NHSScotland must be
recognised as a modern employer.
"In the UK, two million workers and former workers
suffer from work related ill-health each year and improving
safety is a must for any responsible employer. Staff should
not be made ill or suffer injury in the course of going
about their work."
The Health at Work PIN Guideline covers all the major
health and safety issues that could affect staff as part of
their day-to-day work.
For the first time ever, these guidelines will provide
NHS Boards with an ultimate sanction of withholding
treatment from violent patients.
Launching the guideline the Minister said:
"This sanction - backed by staff - is the right step for
us to take to deter attacks against health service workers.
This new guidance will help staff deal with the small
minority of individuals who make such violent attacks and
ensure that all NHS staff feel safer and more secure at
work.
"The vast majority of patients have nothing to fear from
this new sanction. In fact, I am sure that the public will
stand with NHS staff and support them in the valuable job
that they do."
The new constitution and remits for the SPF and HR Forum
were agreed by the stakeholders on 25 October 2002.
Membership of both is drawn from trade unions and
Professional Bodies, trust/health board management and the
Scottish Executive Health Department (SEHD). The SPF will
now have a broader more strategic role and will engage in
all major topics affecting the future of NHSScotland. It
will be involved in formulation of policy as well as
driving practical implementation initiatives and
championing partnership behaviours.
The SPF was set up in order to:
- Provide the main forum where trade unions,
professions and NHSScotland work together to influence
national priorities and policy on health issues;
- Ensure the principles of partnership are practised
in NHSScotland and the Scottish Executive;
- Champion partnership between NHSScotland and other
organisations;
- Develop partnership working through evidence based
schemes; and
- Promote and facilitate the behavioural changes that
genuine partnership working entails.
The remit of the HR Forum is to ensure NHSScotland:
- Operates as an exemplar employer;
- Scotland-wide agreements on HR issues are used
across all employers whenever consistency is
appropriate;
- Adopts national agreements to support the
modernisation agenda in Scotland;
- Adopts appropriate implementation procedures for HR
policy; and
- Introduces new HR policy and agreements which make
most effective use of resources.
PIN Board was established by the NHSScotland Partnership
Forum but in future will be linked to the HR Forum.
Membership is drawn from Trade Unions/Professional
Organisations, Trust/Health Board management and SEHD HR
Department. It was set up to produce guidelines for
development of good employment practice for use across
Scotland.
The new guideline includes sections on major issues that
can affect staff during their daily work and offers model
policies on:
- dealing positively with stress at work;
- promoting attendance;
- Tobacco, alcohol and other substances;
- promoting safe manual handling;
- protecting the health, safety and welfare of people
working alone;
- protecting against violence and aggression at
work;
- protecting staff against violence and aggression at
work;
- reducing work-related driving risks;
- incident management; and
- biological and chemical dangers.
The guideline reflects the Scottish Executive's
priorities for NHSScotland. SEHD will work closely with
other UK Health Departments to maximise all our efforts in
the occupational and health and safety field and avoid
duplication.
Withholding treatment in the guideline has been
carefully drawn up to ensure that it will not apply to
cases where a patient, in the expert judgement of a
clinician, is not considered competent for their behaviour,
e.g. where a patient is mentally ill. Treatment will not be
refused either in cases where patients, require emergency
treatment.