Case study - Cumbria

North Cumbria PCT staff sides battle campaign - a personal account by Juliet Wilson, CSP steward

Setting the scene

We had been together as a staff side for only 18 months but in that time we had become a close knit bunch with no union being more important than another and each having a seat on the Joint Consultative Committee.

We had problems getting management to agree to a Partnership Agreement - AfC had been driven by the union reps - and there were rumblings about the future of the 9 community hospitals eventually resulting in the staff side getting 2 seats on the Community services Review Committee (a poisoned chalice?). Then, in the spring of 2005, there was a management restructuring (to save £400,000) which was a catalogue of errors on management's part from beginning to end. At one point in that process the unions withdrew from all partnership working and pulled the staff reps off the matching panels. A "blood bath" followed which led, in early November 2005, to a mediation session taking place between the two sides. From this I hope you can realise that we had already been through a lot and I, as staff side Chair, knew I had the 100% backing of all the union reps.

We already had good communication links: all reps had access to e-mail, management had agreed to us having the facility to hit the "all user" button to communicate with all staff in the PCT (if management can communicate with staff in this way, why can't the staff side we argued!!) and we regularly sent out 'messages from the unions' - we had a list of e-mail addresses and telephone numbers of all the local newspapers, radio stations and television, although up to this point we had never contacted them.

Two weeks after the mediation session had taken place, at 7pm on a Thursday evening the Chief Executive issued a briefing paper to all staff via e-mail which stated that the health economy of North Cumbria was £17.5 million recurring in deficit, with a historic debt of £54 million. To save that money he was proposing that 7 out of the 9 community hospitals were to lose their beds and possibly close completely. As Physiotherapy (and Podiatry, Speech & Language, OT etc) departments are attached to the hospitals jobs were also at risk, especially at the Senior 1 level and above (due to a review of skill mix).

Action

The first I knew about the briefing paper was when I opened my emails on the Friday morning. I then contacted the other union reps and we decided to put out a press statement, also sending it out to all staff denouncing what was in the briefing and giving my telephone number as the contact. Once the blue touch paper had been lit all hell broke loose - the phone was red hot with reporters wanting statements and the local radio wanting to do live interviews. I think it is important that you only have one or two reps who speak to the press otherwise wrong messages can be sent out. Also, have someone else answering the phone which gives you a breathing space to decide what you are going to say!

Staff from the affected hospitals were ringing up in shock asking what they should do - I told them to get hold of some old sheets and write 'save our hospital' and get them outside on the hospital railings. Petitions were also started and emailed around the hospitals. By the end of that day we had had coverage on all local radio stations, local television and in the evening papers. Throughout what ensued our union full time officers (FTOs) were kept informed of all developments.

The Trust Board were meeting on the following Thursday so an emergency union meeting was called for the Tuesday to decide our next campaign tactics. We called for staff to attend the Trust Board meeting. Placards were needed - the CSP came up trumps! - if your members are going to take time off work to demonstrate they like to have a placard or banner. It was decided I would read a statement out on behalf of the staff (we needed permission from the Chair of the Trust Board to do this) and we had to draft this and agree it. The press had to be contacted again to let them know that a demonstration was going to be taking place and who to contact for interviews. And we also discussed our next moves.

The Trust Board meeting was very well attended by staff and members of the public. By this time each of the local League of Friends of the affected community hospitals had also organised themselves and were also there in force. It was an extremely cold, windy November day and thermals were the order of the day. We all trooped into the Board meeting and I read out the prepared statement to cheers and applause from the public (if you have prepared a statement to read out always have copies of it ready to hand out to the press).

We made appointments to meet with all MPs in North Cumbria - we have 4 so shared the work out between the reps and we have stayed in close contact with them ever since. In the end it was the MPs who got us our stay of execution.

Reps were also working behind the scenes on the following:

• keeping in contact with staff at each of the community hospitals
• keeping in contact the Leagues of Friends and feeding back any information
• getting badges and car stickers printed and distributed
• ensuring all union notice boards were kept up to date
• attending public meetings as each community planned how they were going to save their hospital - although one hospital wasn't picked off against the other and the fight was to save all community hospitals.

There were regular 'message from the unions' urging staff to write to their local MP and keeping them up-to-date with what was happening, times and dates and where the marches were setting off from.

Because of the public uproar - which I like to think we had a lot to do with from issuing the original press statement - the Strategic Health Authority stepped in and put everything on hold until the Government's White Paper on Care in the Community came out in January. By this stage, just before Christmas, a march had been organised by the League of Friends through the streets of Penrith to coincide with the Trust Board meeting which was going to discuss the closure of the hospitals. The Board meeting was pulled but the march went ahead with over 2,000 people on it.

January was quiet but the local press kept the story on the front page week in and week out well into April.

In February there was a 24 hour bed sit-in on a Saturday in the centre of Keswick with theatrical accompaniment from the local theatre company. There was also a march through Maryport headed by the local Labour MP starting from the hospital going to the civic hall where there was a public meeting.

Wigton was next to march and staged a New Orleans funeral march from the hospital to the town centre on a Saturday morning, fronted by a jazz band with a coffin which was carried ahead of the march. The public were asked to dress brightly and carry a decorated umbrella.

March was Cockermouth's turn and a hospital bed with patient was pushed from the hospital to one of the churches (the only place that could hold over 300 people). As this was my patch I was invited by the mayor of Cockermouth to address the public. So there I stood on the platform with our Labour MP giving the opening speech calling for management to see sense and keep the hospitals open.

A trip to London, organised by League of Friends to hand petitions in at 10 Downing Street, coincided with rally by CHANT (Community Hospitals Acting Nationally Together)

Starting on April Fools Day there was a 2 day staged event linking all community hospitals in North Cumbria using various modes of transport - vintage tractor, Harley Davison, pony & trap, canoe, runners, cyclists and vintage cars were used to transport a growing chain of links picked up at each hospital then presented to the Trust Board to signify the unity of all the hospitals

Two weeks later it was announced that the Labour MPs had secured £18 million from the Nuclear Decommissioning Agency over 3 years to keep the community hospitals open. So they are safe for now. But all health services in North Cumbria are under review with the remit of saving £17.5 million a year. The report will be out in September 2006 and after having had a bit of a breather since April we are now starting to organise ourselves for the next fight.

Advice

• Make sure the staff side are organised - all on email, telephone numbers are shared
• Have the ability to press the 'all user' button on the email system - make sure it works before you really need it
• Keep staff updated on what is happening - include photos of demonstrations/marches. Keep it simple and snappy
• Get permission to speak to the press
• Have a list of press email addresses/telephone numbers
• Know who your MPs are and their contact details
• If you are lucky enough to have a union office use it
• Delegate tasks amongst reps
• Keep your CSP Senior Negotiating Officer (SNO) updated - they can liaise with Frontline and other union full time officers
• If you have League of Friends committees make contact with them (ours too only used to be fundraisers)
• Make contact with town councillors, Neighbourhood Forums, Age Concern, Lions, Rotary Club, Women's Institute etc etc (if you have an active League of Friends they will do this for you).
• Get placards, banners (we had 30 foot ones on road sides in each town featuring a hospital under threat of closure, cost £40), badges, car stickers
• Distribute petitions everywhere - in every department, every hospital, every shop: decide what's going to happen to them at the end of your campaign
• Publicity stunts - marches (if you're going to march decide what significant place you are setting off from and where to, time of day, who is going to marshal it, get permission from the police and agree what will happen at the end, eg if speeches, who by?), bed pushes, lobbying the Trust Board meetings
• When demonstrating outside Trust Board meetings make sure you have all entrances covered and arrive at least 1 hour before it starts
• If giving interviews have a bottle of water with you, its amazing how dry your mouth gets
• If management will speak with you keep that channel open - ours went to ground
• When issuing a press statement ensure you have cleared your diary for the day (ours was a knee jerk reaction and I had a full list of patients - fortunately a work colleague manned the phone for me)
• Ensure you have the support and understanding of your manager and most importantly ensure you have the support and understanding of those you work closely with.

Related documents

You can see the full campaigning brief in our publications section.

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