Two ambulance workers used an uninsured NHS vehicle to make a 'booze-cruise' trip to France, a disciplinary panel heard yesterday.Oh, dear. And there’s more:
Paul Leaman and Richard Lane even ripped the back seats out to make more room for alcohol, and removed crests from the vehicle so they could slip through customs unnoticed.
They then got Essex Ambulance Service NHS Trust to foot the bill, the Health Professions Council was told.
In a separate allegation, the men, who were both paramedics but later moved into management positions, are said to have colluded with a company selling health service equipment and 'hassled' colleagues to give the firm business, even though it did not offer competitive rates.Whoops!
The misconduct hearing has also been told they bullied a colleague, Paul Holmes, when he reported their behaviour to trust bosses.
But how did they have time for all this? Aren’t ambulance personnel undermanned and underresourced, and always rushing to meet senseless deadlines and impossible targets?
Well, these weren’t the frontline workers that do a mostly difficult and thankless job. The clue is in the paragraph above, referring to 'management positions'. These were civil service pen pushers of the kind that no self-respecting empire likes to be without:
Leaman was the trust's director of modernisation and service delivery, before going on to become deputy chief executive.That’s really no surprise, now is it?
He is now on secondment with Midlands Air Ambulance as charity appeals director.
Lane was the associate director of human relations but left in 2005. He admits colluding with a supplier between 2000 and 2001.He admits it?
So why the disciplinary panel? Do they deny the other allegations then?
Both admit making unauthorised alterations to a company vehicle before taking it on a trip to France in 2001, with no tax or insurance and at a cost to the NHS. They also admit bullying a colleague.Ummm….
So, they admit doing these things. Why is the hearing still continuing then?
However, they deny misconduct.Yeah, I know. I had trouble with that one too. Let’s have it again:
However, they deny misconduct.….
Nope, still doesn’t compute. If the above misdeeds don’t add up to misconduct, there’s something very, very rotten in their contract of employment…
4 comments:
Wonderful people. Constant press reports of ambulances used by paramedics for supermarket shopping trips, unofficial visits to nightclubs and 'gigs' confirm established customs and practises.
In comparison to the paramedic who recently stole £800 from a dying pensioner's home, his colleagues appear saintly.
Oh the deviousness of the human being. This sort of thing has always amazed me. I was always up for a laugh, a joke and the occasional prank but this sort of thing was way beyond my impish nature.
"Constant press reports of ambulances used by paramedics for supermarket shopping trips, unofficial visits to nightclubs and 'gigs' confirm established customs and practises."
Oh, every job has its bad apples. The difference is in how they are dealt with. Or, not dealt with....
"This sort of thing has always amazed me."
It's amazing what people believe they can get away with, isn't it? I wonder where they got those ideas.
If you were to actually find out about these two men then you would realise that they have both made long term and worthwhile changes the to ambulance service Mr Lane for example helped set up the very board that disciplined him. The fact that the "whistle blower" in question took six years to stew over the fact that he had been disciplined while in the ambulance service shows something about the relevance and motives of the whole case. not only this but you have to consider the amount of people that spoke highly of both Mr Lane and Mr Leaman close friends and colleagues showed great support to the two men yet they are advertised to us as cads and lesser people. The fact that they had to work up to those roles through doing those thankless jobs mentioned such as scaling scaffolding to stop someone jumping off or on countless occasions putting themselves at risk to save others, maybe we should show them some respect instead of sending them to the dogs as soon as they do something human like try and enjoy themselves. Maybe even and I know this is radical but the press may have amplified this case made villains when really there weren't any. Good job some people don't always believe everything they read hook line and sinker or else so many lives would be destroyed by the bloodsuckers that call themselves journalists.
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