NSW: Health dept considering Collins' response

AAP General News (Australia)
12-19-2003
NSW: Health dept considering Collins' response

SYDNEY, Dec 19 AAP - NSW Health officials are deliberating on the future of the bureaucrat
in charge of two hospitals beset by poor care and patient deaths in Sydney's south-west.

Macarthur Health Service's former general manager Jennifer Collins was transferred
to a $165,000 job elsewhere in the Health Department after a storm of controversy broke
out over the deaths of 19 people over four years related to maltreatment at Campbelltown
and Camden Hospitals.

She was issued with a "show cause" demand to explain why she should not be sacked,
and Ms Collins responded through her lawyers yesterday.

A spokesman for NSW Health Minister Morris Iemma confirmed meetings were being held
today to discuss Ms Collins' response.

"Jennifer Collins did respond to her show cause (letter) yesterday through her legal
representatives to the director-general for health," the spokesman said.

"Obviously it's not in anybody's interest to let it drag on, but we can't just rush
through these things either."

Mr Iemma would issue a statement later today to update the situation, his spokesman said.

Opposition health spokesman Barry O'Farrell today renewed his demands that Ms Collins
be sacked without any compensation or salary payout.

A memo from a senior clinician to Ms Collins on September 25 last year outlined various
shortcomings at Camden and Campbelltown hospitals, describing them as "clearly substandard".

"Any payout would be a kick in the guts to the whistleblower nurses who brought this
scandal to the public's attention, but have paid such a high personal cost," Mr O'Farrell
said.

"Unlike Ms Collins, the nurses have been left in limbo and some haven't been paid in
over a year."

AAP gmw/sd/cjh/de

KEYWORD: HOSPITALS COLLINS

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