A HSE director has secured a High Court order temporarily restraining the organisation from what she claims is the unlawful termination of her contract due to occur on Thursday.
Lorna Lynch SC, successfully applied for an interim injunction restraining the HSE from treating her client, Louise Callanan, “as anything otherwise than an employee of the HSE” until any further order the court is made.
Ms Callanan, of Rochestown, Cork, is employed as an e-health director and assistant national director with the HSE. She was hired for the South/Southwest Hospital Group in March 2022.
She is seeking to block the termination of her employment on the basis that she is a permanent employee.
In her court papers, Ms Callanan said she applied to the South/Southwest Hospital Group role after viewing an advertisement in October 2021, which referenced the establishment of the HSE Southwest Health Region.
She claims the role was described as “full time” and the appointee would assist in the management and delivery of public health and social care services in the Cork and Kerry region.
Ms Callanan successfully interviewed for the role and claims she was told during the process that she was applying for a “permanent” role and it would transition into the new “HSE Southwest” structure, which was launched last month.
The plaintiff also submits that she received a letter of offer on March 30th, 2022, which identified the position as “permanent” but there had been a reference in the cover letter to a “specified-purpose contract”, which was to expire on April 3rd, 2025.
Ms Lynch told Mr Justice Brian Cregan that her client claims she was notified last month by letter that her employment was only on a fixed-term contract for a “specified purpose” and expiring on April 3rd, despite being assured by her chief executive and human resources department numerous times that she was a permanent employee.
Ms Lynch said her client “by way of context” claims she was penalised because she made a Protected Disclosure in 2023 over a contract awarded to a health information management company in that there was a failure to ensure full data protection assessments were carried out.
In her papers, Ms Callanan says she had “serious concerns that these failures constituted a breach” of data protection laws.
The plaintiff claims that after she raised her concerns, she was refused support from her line manager and that 56 of 60 scheduled meetings with her chief executive were cancelled within 18 months.
Ms Callanan further claims she was subject to unfair supervision and criticism, as well as two malicious complaints of which she was cleared and exonerated.
She claims she was allocated the smallest budget and workforce within the regional departments of e-health directors and that requests for time off and expenses had been “challenging or delayed”.
The plaintiff also says a HSE letter from March 25th last was “astonishing” in that a HR chief wrote to her contending that there had been “an administrative error” in the letter of appointment, when it incorrectly used the word “permanent” to describe Ms Callanan’s job.
Mr Justice Cregan granted the ex parte injunction application – where only one side is represented – and adjourned the matter to Friday.
