{"id":155388,"date":"2025-09-23T12:38:22","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T12:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/155388\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T12:38:22","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T12:38:22","slug":"increase-in-north-cumbria-nhs-staff-reporting-racist-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/155388\/","title":{"rendered":"Increase in North Cumbria NHS staff reporting racist abuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Directors of North Cumbria Integrated Care met at the Cumberland Infirmary on Wednesday, making key decisions<\/a> about the NHS trust’s services.\n<\/p>\n

\n NCIC is responsible for acute services in the area including West Cumberland Hospital and the Cumberland Infirmary.\n<\/p>\n

\n Directors received a report from Jordanne McMullan Lead Freedom to Speak-Up Guardian on her work within the trust.\n<\/p>\n

\n Jordanne McMullan, Lead Freedom to Speak-Up Guardian at North Cumbria Integrated Care(Image: NCIC)\n<\/p>\n

\n Freedom to Speak-Up (FTSU) is a scheme that encourages NHS staff to raise concerns or ask for support if they need it.\n<\/p>\n

\n The board were presented with the team’s figures from April to June (quarter one of 2025\/26).\n<\/p>\n

\n READ MORE: NCIC chairman ‘unhappy’ with trust’s national ranking<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms McMullan also shed some light on the issues raised so far in quarter two (July to September 30) which included more reports of racism than previously.\n<\/p>\n

\n She said: “Throughout quarter one, we’ve continued to see an increase in speaking-up.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The Cumberland Infirmary Hospital in Carlisle(Image: Archive)\n<\/p>\n

\n The “intensity” of reports has also increased during that period.\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms McMullan said: “We’ve received a lot more in relation to patient safety and quality, which I think is positive, it’s not necessarily that those issues weren’t there it’s just that there’s a confidence in being able to voice them.”\n<\/p>\n

\n Quarter one of 2025\/26 brought 44 new Freedom to Speak-Up cases and 19 were closed within the quarter.\n<\/p>\n

\n A stock image of a busy hospital ward.(Image: Unsplash)\n<\/p>\n

\n Speak-up reports involving bullying and harassment overall dropped to eight in the first quarter of this financial year, from 15 in the final quarter of 2024\/25.\n<\/p>\n

\n However, Ms McMullan said: “One thing that’s happening this quarter, and I think it’s a result of what’s in the news, we’re getting an increase in reports around racism.\n<\/p>\n

\n “We’re doing a lot of work in the background to action those.”\n<\/p>\n

\n READ MORE: Serco currently has rental contracts on 131 houses in HMOs<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n The NCIC has reached out to regional colleagues “to try and get an indication on what action’s happening, what good practice there is from a regional perspective and what we can do to improve.”\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms McMullan said: “We’re trying to look at both elements, from an organisational perspective but also, making sure that individuals that are experiencing the racist comments have that wrap around care.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The FTSU team are encouraging Emergency Care staff to speak-up as reporting has been low, despite a staff survey revealing that 77 per cent of them are subjected to bullying and harassment from patients.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Directors of North Cumbria Integrated Care met at the Cumberland Infirmary on Wednesday, making key decisions about the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102,2960,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-155388","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-healthcare","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}