The Hospital del Poniente (in El Ejido) is in hot water after unions revealed that it has had to hire hundreds of temporary workers to replace downsized doctors fired due to the budget crisis.
Amongst other “temporary” workers hired in recent weeks are specialists such as anesthesiologists, surgeons, ophthalmologists and trauma experts.
Up to 50% of the worker in the building are currently temporary specialists hired short term, and many of them are the same doctors who were earlier fired after the Junta slashed personnel budgets across Andalucia.
CCOO, the union, claims that the hiring of temporary workers is far more expensive than keeping the original doctors would have been, and that the hospital is panicking because after firing the staff it has been unable to meet patient waiting times – leaving the hospital open to claims of compensation from outraged patients.
Doctors within the hospital have complained that a “secret committee” formed by the Director General of the hospital and her immediate staff has been formed in order to hide the scheme as much as possible from the public eye. Indeed, generic adverts for temporary medical contracts have been found in the specialist press which carry the personal phone number of the DG, who then quietly and personally hires the person in order to avoid the contracts being publically issued.