King’s Mill Hospital bosses ‘not progressing’ with mandatory vaccine policy

However, the trust – which runs Sutton’s King’s Mill and Mansfield Community hospitals – says it is continuing to hold ‘person-centred’ conversations with employees yet to take up the vaccine, with bosses also checking staff records to ensure they are aware of who is yet to be jabbed.

Health Secretary Sajid Javid has said there are plans to scrap the rule that all frontline NHS staff must be Covid vaccinated and a consultation is being launched.

It means any NHS staff who are patient-facing, but have still not had the vaccine can keep their jobs, provided Parliamentary approval is won following the consultation.

Hundreds of NHS workers in the county could have been sacked over the requirement.

At SFH, less than 5 per cent of the trust’s 5,000-strong workforce remain unvaccinated, a director confirmed this week.

Conversations

Speaking at the latest trust board meeting, Clare Teeney, SFH director of people, said the trust is now halting any work to ensure staff are vaccinated.

She said: “The piece of work we’ve been focused on recently is around the mandated vaccinations for health and care staff.

“Colleagues will be aware there has been a pause in that, the Secretary of State has announced a wider consultation around whether the vaccination should be mandated or not.

“In the meantime, we are not progressing in terms of it being a mandated vaccination.

“What we are doing is continuing to have person-centred conversations with colleagues who haven’t had a vaccination to try to support people to have one.

“We are also validating records – we’ve still got some records where we can’t see whether people are vaccinated.

“The response of colleagues to having a vaccination has been really good throughout the programme, and we have got more than 95 per cent of colleagues who are vaccinated.”

The Government’s decision was welcomed by union bosses and council leaders.

Coun Ben Bradley, Nottinghamshire County leader and Mansfield MP, said: “It’s important for the service and all those individual members of staff who have grafted throughout the most high-risk period of the pandemic to know they are secure in their jobs going forward.”

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