Government fails to consult charity on rule change sparked by religious minority

Governance | Niki May Young | 13 Apr 2010

MRSA Action UK chairman Derek Butler has questioned the Department of Health after it changed hospital clothing regulations to pacify religious objectors.

The decision, he said, was taken without any prior consultation with the charity and poses a danger to the "zero tolerance" policy for preventing MRSA and other transmittable infections.

A panel was convened by the Department of Health to re-examine its Uniforms and Workwear guidance after one Muslim nurse resigned due to the 'bare below the elbows' dress policy and the department became aware the policy "presented difficulties for a minority of Muslim female healthcare workers and students".

Butler is an advocate of 'bare below the elbows', which forbids medical professionals to wear any jewellery, watches or long sleeves, and was consulted prior to its implementation in 2007.

But the Department of Health, working with the Muslim Spiritual Care Provision in the NHS, a resource for "recruiting, training and empowering Muslim chaplains in the health service", carried out an "equality impact assessment" and changed the guidance to allow long sleeves if plastic gloves were worn on top.

This is a change which Butler believes is not easily implemented.

"We know that wearing gloves doesn’t work. People don’t change gloves, we’ve already seen this," he said.

Butler told Civil Society he doesn’t know why he was left out of the discussions and that despite having a meeting with the national director of the HCAI and Cleanliness Division at the Department of Health, Janice Stevens, a week before the changes were released, he was not informed. "I can’t imagine that she wouldn’t have known about it," Butler added.

Both Janice Stevens and the Department of Health have failed to respond to requests by Civil Society for information about the meeting and the impact assessment.

Comments

[Cancel] | Reply to:

Name *

Email *

Organisation

Job Title

Comments *

Verification *

* Please read our Community Standards

Close »

Community Standards

The civilsociety.co.uk community and comments board is intended as a platform for informed and civilised debate.

We hope to encourage a broad range of views, however, there are standards that we expect commentators to uphold. We reserve the right to delete or amend any comments that do not adhere to these standards.

We welcome:

Robust but respectful debate
Strongly held opinions
Intelligent relevant discussion
The sharing of relevant experiences
New participants

We will not publish:

Rude, threatening, offensive, obscene or abusive language, or links to such material
Links to commercial organisations or spam postings. The comments board is not an advertising platform
The posting of contact details for yourself or others
Comments intended for malicious purpose or mindless abuse
Comments purporting to be from another person or organisation under false pretences
Gratuitous criticism, commentary or self-promotion
Any material which breaches copyright or privacy laws, or could be considered libellous
The use of the comments board for the pursuit or extension of personal disputes

Be aware:

Views expressed on the comments board are left at users’ discretion and are in no way views held or supported by Civil Society Media
Comments left by others may not be accurate, do not rely on them as fact
You may be misunderstood - sarcasm and humour can easily be taken out of context, try to be clear

Please:

Enjoy the opportunity to express your opinion and respect the right of others to express theirs
Confine your remarks to issues rather than personalities

Together we can keep our community a polite, respectful and intelligent platform for discussion.