A HEALTH board manager yesterday told an industrial tribunal he offered a part-time surgeon an extra half-day a week in recognition of his on-call commitment to avoid disruption and poor teamwork.
Mr Brian Liddle, unit general manager with Western Isles Health Board, said surgeon Debabrata Chatterjee's estimate of his emergency workload was exaggerated but he offered to pay him for an extra half-day a week.
Mr Chatterjee, 58, a GP on South Uist, is seeking #71,000 from the health board. He has taken the board to a tribunal claiming he was overworked and underpaid as part-time surgeon at Daliburgh Hospital on South Uist.
The tribunal in Glasgow heard earlier that he was paid for four half-day sessions a week at the hospital but Mr Chatterjee, who has since been dismissed from the surgical post, claimed the workload amounted to eight sessions a week as he was also on call round the clock and had to deal with emergencies.
Mr Liddle told the tribunal they informed all incoming practitioners there were advantages and disadvantages in working in the Western Isles. The advantages were the working relationships, the quality of life, and the standard of facilities. The disadvantage was that emergency duties were greater and on-call commitment was far more onerous.
He said he offered Mr Chatterjee an extra half-day because the dispute had continued for a considerable time and a poor relationship with practitioners could prove disruptive and did not make for good teamwork.
``I was prepared at that stage to try and move forward and resolve the situation,'' Mr Liddle added. He said the offer, which was not backdated, was not accepted.
Mr Liddle said there had been a ``painstaking search'' of patients records at Daliburgh to assess the workload. He said Dr Chatterjee's workload was static and his on-call commitment was minimal.
He said Mr Chatterjee's account of his hours was exaggerated and he found it unacceptable. Mr Chatterjee's contract precluded him from attending casualties and was for surgical work only.
The tribunal heard the situation at Daliburgh and Lochmaddy was under close scrutiny because of suggestions for a central hospital at Benbecula.
Mr Liddle added: ``I discussed the workload at Daliburgh Hospital with Mr Chatterjee. I asked him his opinion of the amount of time he actually spent at the hospital. I spoke to the area medical officer. I spoke to the unit director and looked at the hospital records. I thought Mr Chatterjee's claim was exaggerated in the extreme.''
He said work associated with being on call was minimal with 18 or 19 call-outs in one year.
An earlier report into the hospital found the surgical workload was not sufficient to maintain the surgical team and not enough to maintain expertise. It was recommended certain abdominal operations should no longer take place at Daliburgh.
Mr Liddle said Mr Chatterjee's post was probably the most assessed in the UK and Daliburgh the most assessed hospital. He denied he had been considering removing him from his post.
The tribunal heard Mr Chatterjee was dismissed following an allegation of professional misconduct before his contractual dispute had been resolved. His sacking is presently the subject of an appeal to the Secretary of State.
The hearing continues.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article