By Anna Whittaker, Local Democracy Reporter
Leaders at the Trust that runs the Queen’s Medical Centre and City Hospital will face questions from councillors on how it is tackling bullying and racism.
Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) Trust is rated requires improvement by healthcare watchdog the Care Quality Commission (CQC). The CQC has also highlighted issues with how ‘well led’ the trust is.
Concerns over the leadership of the organisation were so serious that the Trust was served with a warning notice after a 2021 inspection – requiring them to make widespread changes.
A number of allegations of bullying cases were found to be “directly attributable to racial discrimination”, and some staff were “too frightened” to speak up.
NUH has been invited to a Nottingham City Council meeting this week to discuss its work to support ethnic minority colleagues and tackle issues of racism in the workforce.
The issues will be discussed at the authority’s health scrutiny committee on February 16.
A report by NUH prepared ahead of the meeting says it has “heard examples of direct and indirect racism, colleagues feeling excluded or ignored, micro-aggressions and examples of using pressures as an excuse for bullying”.
Some staff also reported that “bullying [was] becoming the norm” and “there is a lack of trust in the processes to achieve resolution”.
The Trust’s Chief Executive, and those in roles which NUH call the Chair of the BAME Network and the Chair of the BAME Shared Governance Council, will be attending the meeting.
Chief Executive Anthony May joined NUH in September 2022 and quickly set out a commitment to tackling bullying and racism within the Trust.
NUH’s report to the meeting explains how it has listened to staff concerns through the ‘Big Conversation’ survey, forums and stakeholder events.
The Trust has also employed three full time ‘Freedom to Speak Up Guardians’
who support staff to speak up when they feel that they are unable to do so
by other routes.
There has been a 51 per cent increase in contacts with these members of staff from March 2021 to March 2022.
The report added: “When developing a culture that is open and honest and where staff feel safe and supported when raising their concerns, we would expect an increase in reporting.
“We are therefore encouraged to see that issues are being raised that would otherwise not have been.
“Culture change does take time and we are encouraged that the indicators show that we are moving in the right direction.”
