Telford whistleblower wins sacking tribunal

Leslie Small of Holyhead Road, Wellington, informed the Health and Safety Executive about damaged asbestos panels at residential quarters in block three at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital in Mytton Oak Road, Shrewsbury.

He complained he later lost his job after making the whistle blowing disclosure and made a legal claim for unfair dismissal at Birmingham Employment Tribunal against the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust.

The tribunal had decided at an earlier hearing that Mr Small had been unfairly dismissed.

The latest hearing was to decide how much compensation he should receive.

Julia Clarke, director of corporate governance at the trust, said: "The safety of patients, staff and visitors at our hospital sites is of paramount importance to the trust, which is why these concerns have been taken very seriously.

"We would encourage any staff member who has a genuine safety concern to raise this at the earliest opportunity."

Mr Small told the tribunal he had since applied for jobs without success and was now facing financial problems which was causing him stress.

He had been appointed as a project manager to help deal with building and construction work for the NHS and was said to be a specialist in structural work.

The NHS also engaged other project managers for new building work which could cost millions of pounds, it was said.

The tribunal was told that Mr Small's appointment had been initially for three days a week on a temporary basis and later became a full time post. The trust, which had opposed his legal claim, denied that Mr Small had lost his job because of the disclosure about asbestos.

The respondents said Mr Small had been a worker, rather than an employee, and that he would have eventually lost his job anyway when his short term contract came to an end.

After Mr Small contacted the Health & Safety Executive about the asbestos he later received a letter marked as "strictly private and confidential" from the hospital.

The trust denied in the letter that they had attempted to conceal details about any suspected asbestos exposure and said it had commissioned an independent review of the situation.

Tribunal judge Miss Sherri Warren said the tribunal panel would make a decision about the compensation at a later date.

The trust said the incident related to an area of the hospital site not accessed by patients and visitors, and that employees, agency or temporary staff members or volunteers were actively encouraged to speak up if they felt something was wrong. The trust has signed up to the Nursing Times' Speak Out Safely campaign.