In February 2008, a nurse was raped in her remote house on Mabuiag Island. The accommodation was provided as part of her occupation and risk assessments have identified that the house was not secure, poorly maintained and, in my opinion, unsafe. Previous SafetyAtWorkBlog posts on this issue are available HERE.
On 19 August 2008, the Queensland Minister for Health, Stephen Robertson, officially opened primary health centres on both Warraber and Erub Islands.
The Warraber Island facility cost $A4.45 million and includes:
- two, two-bedroom staff accommodation units
- expanded clinical areas
- a dental chair
- a conference room.
The $6.84 million Erub Island facility includes:
- a three-bedroom doctor’s residence
- two, two-bedroom staff accommodation units
- expanded clinical areas, including a dental chair, a morgue, and a conference room for video conferencing.
The media release emphasizes a feature rarely mentioned:
“Both centres have secure accommodation units to ensure the safety of local health staff.”
Theses costs are for upgraded clinics with very good facilities and housing is only part of the projects.
Beth Mohle, Assistant Secretary with the Queensland Nurses Union, told me today that the official opening of these facilities had been delayed for several months due to the difficult of providing a reliable electricity supply to the clinics. These facilities had been planned for a considerable time, well before the February 2008 attack. In fact the previous facilities on Erub Island had been so bad that the facility was condemned.
Beth said that the new clinics had been assessed by the union’s OHS officer in March 2008 and found to be very suitable. There were several minor security issues but the union was generally happy with the clinics.
A formal maintenance schedule for the facilities has been committed to be the government.
Beth said that the remaining outstanding issue for negotiation with Queensland Health is the operation of duress buttons for its members. However a trial of a satellite-based system through Skynet Mobile Communications is under way where the community police will be informed immediately of any problems.
The underlying challenge for all OHS issues in Torres Strait seems to be the remoteness. Many of the islands have no mobile phone communication coverage and nursing staff have only recently received automobiles. Previously wheelbarrows were used for transporting equipment on the islands.
To update readers about the circumstances of the nurse who was attacked on Mabuig Island, the case against the attackers is still before the Courts. The nurse is no longer working in that profession and she has a WorkCover claim relating specifically to the effects of the attack.
Beth Mohle spoke optimistically about the progress made on the campaign to improve housing and facilities in these remote communities but we must remember the unnecessarily unsafe conditions that workers were expected to operate in. The future may be hopeful but much of this hope is built on pain and trauma.
Personal alarms are both cheap and readily available. The problem of who monitors their activation can be addressed even in the most remote areas of Australia. Primary security, lock people out, is never the whole answer. Perhaps we need a standard on ‘personal security’ for people who work in such remote areas.