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  • Private Files Put On Street For All To Read

    Posted on July 16th, 2008 NewSunSEO No comments

    PLASTIC wheelie bins full of confidential documents were left outside Rozelle Hospital in a last-minute rush to move the hospital to its new site at Concord.

    Staff records, including details of criminal convictions and personal medical histories, were jammed into the bins along with minutes of meetings and disciplinary proceedings.

    A letter lying at the top of one of the bins details an altercation in January 1991 between a cleaner and his supervisor, who had asked him to clean some windows.

    “Mr A [name deleted] … threw a garbage tin of rubbish on the ground and also said he would kill Mr S … [name deleted],” an exasperated manager notes.

    Other documents detail the property staff members have failed to return over decades.

    Records from the Child Support Agency detailing maintenance deductions the hospital was required to make for individual employees are also included in the thousand of pages of personal documents.

    Anyone wandering through the open hospital grounds, popular with dog walkers, was free to leaf through decades of documents left in the driveway of the administrative and information building, which closed its doors at the site last week.

    Half a dozen wheelie bins left in the driveway of the administration block were locked but six others were open or secured only with adhesive tape applied by desperate staff members unable to get enough bins to secure documents they knew to be confidential. Two of those bins carried notes headed “Confidential documents”.

    The notes, written by a staff doctor, Graeme Halliday, said: “To Whom It May Concern, Ive been requesting confidential paper bins for at least a week before the hospital closed but could not get any. Transport kindly delivered these on Thursday May 1st, but I didnt realise until I had filled them – they are in fact not for the disposal of confidential documents. Quite happy to return to help transfer these to confidential bins if someone can help me obtain these.”

    Yesterday Dr Halliday was furious the bins had been left outside the building and said he had done his best to ensure their contents were properly disposed of.

    He said he had worked until midnight on Saturday trying to dispose of documents he had no time to finish packing as he had had a full patient load during preparations for the move.

    He had left all the bins locked inside the building on Saturday night and was uncertain who had moved them outside.

    Dr Halliday drove immediately to Rozelle Hospital when he heard the documents were outside to ensure they were secured.

    In other parts of the hospital grounds staff record cards spilled from torn plastic bags before a compactor truck arrived yesterday afternoon.

    The director of mental health for the Sydney South West Area Health Service, Dr Victor Storm, said only two normal bins had been used for confidential waste. The bins had been put outside by accident yesterday morning.

    “Both the secure and general waste bins have since been locked away, and a collection is now expected later this week.”

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