Health and safety reps beat bosses' no chairs rule

The unpopular OTP ('Operational Transformation Project') working pattern imposed clunkily by NHSBT management on blood collection teams a few years ago has many flaws according to donor carer staff. One which caused great health concern, with a increasing rise in occupational health referrals, was the attempted removal of chairs for staff from donor sessions.





Union health and safety reps from across the staffside worked together and fought hard against this ruling, using the law as a weapon. A great coup was achieved by getting in the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) to carry out an inspection. The HSE is an under-funded body that rarely visits workplaces.

The HSE report released in March this year fully backed up what health and safety reps had been arguing. Following this blow to their authority management had no choice, in the light of hard evidence, but to accept the findings of the HSE's report and replace chairs. This is a fantastic victory achieved by union reps that will benefit collection teams everywhere.

Health and safety law can be a valuable tool for workers. Over the years union activists have pushed to make it rule in our favour. The fight to improve working conditions goes on constantly. At the extreme end unsafe working can kill and make people seriously ill. Each year more people die through their work than from war.

The ILO (UN International Labour Organisation) estimates that 337 million accidents occur on the job annually, while the number of people suffering from work-related diseases is close to 2 million. These mistakes amount to approximately 2.3 million deaths each year, with 650,000 of them due to hazardous substances – double the number of a few years ago.

Don't forget Workers Memorial Day, 28th April every year across the world. It is a day to remember those who have been killed by work, but also to fight for better health and safety in the present, as reps in NHSBT have been doing.

Night shifts bad for workers' health - Supercentre runs 24 hours

It was reported in today's news that 37 women in Denmark have won the right to compensation after it was proven that working night shifts long-term was linked to them developing breast cancer.



This link was suspected as long ago as 2001. Read more in a report on the research done into it here.

Cancer is not the only health concern around night working. Humans are not nocturnal (we are diurnal, the opposite of nocturnal). Night shift work is believed to cause disturbed sleep, fatigue and digestive problems. There are possible increased risks of diabetes. Scientific studies have shown that sleep disruption can cause the body to produce less melatonin, an important sleep regulating hormone. And accident rates are significantly higher on the night shift than during the day.

This leaflet informs employers that workers are at more risk of accidents when working at night than during the day.

Knowing this, it is a shameful and dangerous step backwards for National Blood Service bosses to decide to centralise blood processing and reduce the number of regional labs. At these regional labs where local blood collections were received, the processing work could be completed in a day, and the workers stop at 11pm. At the Filton supercentre which replaces them, where all blood for the whole of the Midlands and South-West has to be processed, the work rolls non-stop 24 hours round the clock. Now, as a result of this restructuring, unhealthy night shift working is being inflicted onto more workers. It doesn't seem too much to ask when you work in the NHS, helping to save lives, that your employers won't make choices that could shorten your own!

Do you have to work night shifts? Does a friend or family member? Take care - here are some health tips for shift or night time workers and advice from the Health & Safety Executive.

Article on restructuring of US transfusion service

NY Times article about reorganisation of the Red Cross blood tranfusion service in North America. Apparently regulators have found that the transfusion service in the USA has numerous problems - one of the causes being that they are too big, and costs of re-organisation are running far in excess of what was predicted...

WORLD BLOOD DONOR DAY - 14TH JUNE

Today is World Blood Donor Day, an annual event to promote and highlight the amazing and altruistic gift of life which donors give.

Find out more here.

This year's theme is 'Many happy returns', a title chosen to remind us that it is important for donors to give not just once, but regularly, in order to maintain safe stock levels for our hospitals.

Find out about how and where you can donate near you at the National Blood Service website.

Below is the text from a new leaflet promoting both the Save Our Blood Service campaign and the BloodBan campaign.


An Injury to One is an Injury to All

Blood links all of us from donor to patient

It’s generally believed that we live in a selfish, even cruel, world. But humans constantly challenge this view with amazingly generous, social and altruistic behaviour.

Giving blood is pure human solidarity. A patient receiving a transfusion can look up at the pack of red cells feeding into their body and know that someone wanted them to live, without knowing who they are. Blood is a vital fluid that is common to us all.

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Less than 5% of the eligible population give blood, and a lot of money is spent on adverts to recruit donors. At present, men who have sex with men are excluded from donating blood. The current opinion of NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) is that blood from a sexually active gay man may be more likely to carry infections than blood from a straight person. They claim that screening for disease would be too expensive, although they already screen all blood from heterosexuals, where STDs are on the rise.

Logically if gay men could donate, the donor pool would be instantly increased and less would need to be spent on advertising.

Pressure from the BloodBan campaign and from health workers through their unions has caused NHSBT decision makers to agree to incorporate a review of screening policy as one of the priorities under an equality impact assessment to be rolled out across NHSBT in the coming year.

Find out more at: www.bloodban.co.uk

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NHSBT is making cuts to our blood service nationally. A money-driven restructuring plan is slashing the number of labs which test, filter and process blood. This is wasting the skills of 100s of technicians and scientists who are losing their jobs, and means that hospitals’ blood supply is further away, a huge risk in case of emergencies.

Centralisation like this is often a prelude to privatisation. We all know the decline in care which the private sector brings when it gets its fangs into the NHS. The World Health Organisation (WHO) says that a purely voluntary blood service, free from profit, is the safest way to avoid infection. We share a free blood service with less than 25% of the world’s countries – we need to protect it as any one of us could need a transfusion to save our life.

Save Our Blood Service has been fighting cuts in NHSBT. We think that there is a chain of solidarity from the blood donor, to the healthcare workers, right through to the patient receiving the gift of life. We want all of these people to have a greater say in our health service. If you believe the same, we want to hear from you.

To find out more email: nbs.sos@gmail.com or visit: www.nbs-sos.blogspot.com

Campaign update

The strategic review of the centralisation proposals is now complete, and NHSBT management will announce their intentions on February 1st.

In recent weeks, city councils have added to the pressure in opposition by coming out against the plans to close local processing and testing labs. In Birmingham a petition signed by over 7000 angry local residents was handed into the leader of the council. Even more local authorities have declared that if the review does not reconsider the cuts, they too will fight the proposals.

When parliament returned after the Christmas break this year, supporters of the campaign joined forces to greet Health Secretary Alan Johnson (ultimately responsible for decisions relating to the NHS) with a huge number of phone calls and emails protesting the cuts. With a high volume of calls on this issue, from not only this country, but as far afield as the US, Canada, and Poland, there could be no mistake that this issue matters to the public.



Meanwhile we have seen more evidence of why only 3 centres is too risky to accept, as a blood van was caught up in an accident on a motorway in the West Country:

Read the story here.

The support campaign is growing massively via the networking site facebook. The links below take you to various ways to keep informed of campaign news, and help to spread the word about the threatened cuts and the fight to stop them.

Save Our Blood Service facebook group (nearly 1000 members - please join and invite your friends)

Save Our NBS facebook profile (add as a friend)

Save Our National Blood Service ‘Cause’ application (please join and help to recruit)

Finally here is some satire which was written by one of the campaign’s supporters - a spoof interview with Fred Fullogarbage, chairman of a new conglomerate formed after a merger between our National Blood Service and the crashed bank Northern Rock…

A glimpse of the future?

Facebook 'Save our Blood Service' group

Anyone with a Facebook account can join a group in opposition to the centralisation of blood testing and processing, and in favour of saving local labs and NBS staff's jobs. It has links to the petition and other ideas for supporters. The group currently has 662 members with more joining every week!

Simply use the Facebook search facility to find 'Save Our Blood Service'.

Please join it and invite all your friends, as this is a useful way to spread the word about the campaign.

Strategy review underway and everything to play for

The NBS centralisation strategy is currently undergoing review by the consultant agency McKinsey & Co. McKinsey are well-known for being the government's favourite choice of consultants in cases of NHS reorganisation (a.k.a. cuts), as this story illustrates, and boast Enron amongst their past clients...

Well-prepared NBS staff reps have been meeting with McKinsey to put forward our comprehensive arguments against the strategy. Here is one document for submission, which details not only the defensive case but suggests better alternative future directions for the NBS (link also added to links section on right of page).

The review alone is no guarantee that the restructuring plans will be stopped, so supporters can still help by contacting the media, who can help to raise awareness, or your city council, who can intervene if they feel they have not been properly consulted about what the closure of local labs will mean for hospitals.

This link will take you to a page where you can find your local Public and Patient Involvement Forum. This is another way for NHS users to formally get involved in debating plans for health service reconfigurations. Please send a copy of the document above to your area's PPI Forum.

New download: Blood Service Chat flyers

Now available - flyers for Blood Service Chat. Staff please print out, photocopy and circulate around your co-workers like a highly contagious virus...

Click here

Download link also added to the links section on the right hand side of the page.

Blog updates!

Announcing some new updates and links for this blog.

* Blood Service Chat is a brand new message board - for NHSBT staff, by NHSBT staff.
Get to know each other, have a laugh, share problems and advice, or generally moan and rant (anonymously) about anything. Friends welcome.
BSC was inspired by the massively successful Royal Mail Chat, which has helped posties build unity and communication during the hard times of their dispute with Royal Mail bosses.



* Two new campaign resources are now available to download. Please make copies yourself and help to distribute them both.
This is an up-to-date leaflet aimed at donors, patients, other healthworkers and the general public.
Here is the September edition of the NBS Worker, a new shop-floor staff newsletter. It is hoped the NBS Worker will help to bridge the information gap between centres and sectors, which existing news bulletins from the top are failing to do. Staff please get involved with contributing anything you want to - this newsletter belongs to you.
Links also added to the panel on the right.

* An additional resolution passed by Amicus staff in Manchester has been added to this post about the new proposals for testing in Bristol.
Thanks to a combination of solidarity from colleagues in other centres, and rational and assertive negotiating by staff-side reps, most of the major problems with the orignal drastic proposal have been binned - payments will be kept at the present level, the 6 day week is gone, and hours are improved. Some problems do remain with non-standard hours, but the new set-up has to pass a ballot of the Bristol Amicus membership before it goes live.

Sheffield council supports our campaign!

We are delighted to announce that following a debate held between NBS workers and management, Sheffield City Council (Health and Community Care Scrutiny and Policy Development Board) considered their position on the centralisation plans, and have come out publicly, strongly and thoroughly condemning the strategy.

The recent terrible flooding in England almost crippled Sheffield blood centre and it is testimony to the great skill and teamwork of NBS staff there and at connected sites that a reliable supply of blood products was able to be safely maintained to hospitals without too many difficulties. This is proof of the benefits of the Blood Service operating from many local depots and not piling all its eggs into 3 baskets with vulnerable supercentres.

It doesn't take much to persuade people of why we think the proposals are wrong, but well done to the supporters and reps at Trent NBS involved for winning us this valuable victory!

Read the full minutes of the debate on 11th June here

Here is the Council resolution, passed on 25th June 2007.

From Sheffield City Council
NATIONAL BLOOD SERVICE
The Board gave further consideration to its response to the presentation made by the National Blood Service upon the National Health Service Blood and Transplant Service Strategy 2006-10, considered by the Board at its meeting held on 11th June, 2007.
RESOLVED:
That in the light of the information made available, this Board
(a) views with grave concern the proposals outlined by the National Blood Service to re-organise the Service in England and Wales without sufficient evidence of the need to re-organise the Service and particularly with regard to the impact of the re-organisation proposals in the City,
(b) believes that these proposals could result in Manchester being the nearest Testing and Processing Site to the City and serving the whole of the North of England and Wales and the transfer of blood storage and distribution facilities in the City to Leeds, thereby putting at risk the availability of blood and blood products in the City, particularly in emergency situations;
(c) views with disquiet the lack of clarity as to whether or not the Strategy was formulated in consultation with medical experts and laboratory managers from local hospitals and if the strategy has the support of these professionals;
(d) notes with concern the fears expressed by the trades union and others that the proposals would have a severe impact upon the ability of the Children's Hospital to continue its internationally renowned work on children's leukaemia, the training arrangements for Consultant Haematologists in the City, the immediate availability of specialist blood components and the carrying out of specialist research and development activities such as stem cell research, which are presently supplied by the Sheffield Centre;
(e) does not accept the premise put forward by the National Blood Service that the NBS Centre in Sheffield was "not fit for purpose" when the Centre has recently under gone several major refurbishment projects and, in the opinion of managers, is now fit for purpose for at least another 10 years;
(f) would wish to express its dissatisfaction at the apparent lack of accurate costings for the proposals including transportation costs thereby not giving the Board any opportunity to reach "judgment" on the economic veracity of the proposals; (g) is of the view that the underlying philosophy behind the proposals is driven by economic consideration rather than service improvements particularly as no information regarding costings and deployment was made available to the Board;
(h) is concerned that this matter was brought to the attention of the Board in the first instance by the trades unions representing employees of the NBS in the City and not by the NBS and would urge the Secretary of State for Health to remind the Health bodies of their responsibility to engage in meaningful and comprehensive consultations with Local Authorities and other parties regarding proposals for service change and also to request in the strongest possible terms to examine closely the processes for disseminating information and engaging in consultation so as to ensure that substantial systemic improvements are made to prevent this situation arising again;
(i) believes that at a time when all agencies are committed to taking positive steps to reduce the environmental impact of road travel there would be every possibility of an adverse environmental impact through increased transportation of blood
products to the City together with the concomitant dangers of inaccessibility to the City in adverse weather conditions;
(j) whilst recognising that it is not within its remit to become involved with or comment upon the possible adverse economic impact of the proposals upon the City's regeneration would nevertheless urge the Leader of the City Council, the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Economic Regeneration, Culture and Planning and the Chief Executive to pursue this aspect of the proposals with the utmost vigour;
(k) requests that further proposals about this re-organisation be reported to the Board as a matter of urgency; and
(l) requests that copies of this resolution be forwarded to the Sheffield Members of Parliament, the Secretary of State for Health, the Core Cities and the other South Yorkshire Authorities.

How YOU can get involved!

Staff, supporters and union reps have constantly been working to spread the message in all ways possible about the threatened strategy and our opposition. We have written to the media, lobbied MPs both locally and at the Houses of Parliament, spoken at trade union meetings and conferences, and networked extensively with other health campaigners.


Manchester staff working the media


One of many Saturday street stalls in Birmingham city centre


Speaking about the cuts and the campaign against them at Birmingham Trades Council's May Day rally

However there can never be enough of this campaigning activity!
Most people, both medical workers and the general public, are still unaware of the proposals for the NBS, which makes it harder for us to fight them. All of us are potential recipients of freely donated blood. Donors are altruistic people and have a keen interest in the whole transfusion process. They are now being disrespectfully excluded.

You can help our cause directly by adding to the pressure put on the policy makers, and raising awareness of the threatened cuts on our behalf.

* Please tell everyone you know about the threatened centralisation and job cuts in the Blood Service. If you have a website add a link to this page.
* Please write to or phone the local and national media: newspapers, television stations and radio stations.
* Sign our online petition and forward the link onto all your contacts.
* Please write to your MP expressing concern about how your local hospital will be affected by the cuts.
So far MPs have been fobbed off, by NBS management propaganda, from fully joining our campaign against the strategy. However constant letters from constituents about this topic can only make them more likely to call for at least a halt to the restructuring, to allow for real and meaningful consultation.
Use this link to easily contact your MP
* Trade union branches please pass a resolution in support of the NBS workers' campaign, and in opposition to the reconfiguration strategy.
* Future protests will be announced on this blog - please support them in person if you are able to get down to one of the centres near you.
* Leaflets can be downloaded for distribution from the links panel on the right-hand side of this page.
* Finally, if you feel strongly about saving the Blood Service, why not make your feelings known to our boss, Chief Executive Clive Ronaldson?
It may seem pointless but opinions from donors and recipients of blood are valued more than those of staff. Plus it creates extra annoying work if he comes in each morning to a fresh pile of irritated letters and emails on the same subject. Be prepared to wait for a response - and mentally psyche yourself up for the 'everything will be fine' official corporate-speak.

Clive Ronaldson
Managing Director
National Blood Service
Oak House
Read’s Crescent
Watford
Hertfordshire WD24 4PH

clive.ronaldson[AT]nbs.nhs.uk
(replace [AT] with @)

Thanks to all for their support so far.
Post your comments and ideas below...