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The CBI today hit back at public sector union Unison's claims that levels of cleanliness in hospitals have declined as a result of contracting out.
Publishing an analysis of the performance of acute hospital trusts, the CBI revealed that:
- 95 per cent (163 out of 173) of acute hospital trusts have been independently judged to have acceptable levels of cleanliness
- 11 out of the top 20 acute hospital trusts rated for cleanliness had cleaning services provided by business
- 11 out of the bottom 20 acute hospital trusts rated for cleanliness had cleaning services provided by in-house teams.
Data from Patient Environment Action Teams reveals a sharp increase overall in health service cleanliness for the period 2000-2004, with a major decline in the number of hospitals rated as poor and a major increase in the number of hospitals rated as good for standards of cleanliness.
John Williams, CBI director of public services said, "We have shown claims that there is a causal link between the delivery of cleaning services by business and MRSA are totally untrue.
"If anything the opposite is the case. The majority of top performing acute hospital trusts have outsourced their cleaning services.
"Scaremongering about the role of business in the health service is both reckless and irresponsible. Thousands of company employees are delivering high standards of quality cleaning to the health service everyday. Facts should not be the first casualty of the Unison election campaign. These false accusations get us no closer to addressing public concern about how to tackle MRSA."
