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Following is a question by Dr the Hon Leong Che-hung and a reply by the Acting Secretary for Health and Welfare, Mr Gregory Leung, in the Legislative Council today (May 31):

Question:

It has been reported that there are nurses of public hospitals taking up outside jobs without obtaining permission at private hospitals outside working hours. Regarding medical, nursing and allied health staff (hereinafter "medical and health care staff") of public hospitals taking up outside jobs, will the Government inform this Council whether it knows:

(a) the respective numbers of applications received by the Hospital Authority from staff of various medical and health care professions for permission to take up outside jobs and among them, the number of approved cases, in each of the past three years;

(b) if the Hospital Authority has assessed the seriousness of the problem of medical and health care staff taking up outside jobs without permission, and its impact on the quality of medical and health care services provided by public hospitals; and

(c) the measures the Hospital Authority has in place to stop medical and health care staff from taking up outside jobs without permission?

Reply:

Madam President,

(a) All employees of the Hospital Authority (HA) must obtain prior approval from the relevant Hospital Chief Executive or Chief Executive/Hospital Authority before undertaking outside work, except for unpaid outside work outside normal working hours. While HA hospitals and HA Head Office maintain proper record of applications for permission to take up outside jobs and approval thereof, the statistics on the number of applications received and approvals granted are not centrally collated. Nonetheless, within the time available, HA has carried out a quick search of the relevant files for the year 1999-2000, which shows that the number of applications approved for outside work in 1999-2000 is 2 446, including 1 240 from medical officers, 715 from nurses and 491 from allied health professionals.

(b) There is no evidence to suggest that there is a problem of HA staff engaging in unauthorised outside work. According to HA's record, there were only two incidents of health care staff taking up unauthorised outside work in the past three years, involving a medical officer and a registered nurse respectively. Supervisors in HA monitor the performance of their staff closely, ensuring that a high standard of patient care is consistently delivered.

(c) All HA employees are reminded, from time to time, of HA's outside work policy which requires them to seek prior approval before taking up paid outside work or unpaid outside work during normal working hours. Employees who do not comply with this rule are liable to disciplinary actions, which include warning, suspension of salary increment, deduction of salary and dismissal.

END/Wednesday, May 31, 2000

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