NHS Forth Valley chiefs have hit again at criticism over the publication of knowledge into bullying circumstances on the well being board over the past 5 years.
A Freedom of Data request from the Scottish Conservatives queried every of Scotland’s well being boards on the variety of recorded incidents of bullying from 2017-18 as much as the newest information for 2021/22.
The 2021/22 figures have revealed that lower than 5 circumstances have been reported in Forth Valley - with a spokesperson later confirming the precise quantity was three - however have confronted accusations of an “avoidance of scrutiny” over their failure to reveal information for the opposite 4 durations.
Forth Valley was one in all solely two areas which had an incomplete submission to the FOI request, with Ayrshire and Arran additionally offering no information for 2017/18.
The Tories since appealed NHS Forth Valley’s determination, however have reported that the well being board have now upheld their unique determination - citing prices as the rationale.
The state of affairs has led to additional frustration from Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Dean Lockhart, who has urged the Data Commissioner to get entangled within the dispute to induce NHS Forth Valley to adjust to their request.
Mr Lockhart stated: “It can't be acceptable that NHS Forth Valley are unable to offer this data simply.
“Each one of many different 13 well being boards managed to take action with out making a fuss. I'm involved at how the knowledge was stored for such an vital matter.
“I've requested that this be pursued with the Data Commissioner though it's to be regretted that our native well being board is forcing this plan of action by their unhelpful response to an affordable request.”
Nevertheless, an NHS Forth Valley spokeswoman advised the Observer that the knowledge on bullying circumstances has been stored inside particular person employees information and that looking via these information to offer the knowledge would have required “1000's and 1000's of hours of labor”.
The spokeswoman added: “The evaluate wasn’t upheld on this as a result of there was no means of accessing the case numbers with out a considerable amount of effort and time and there's an exemption for this within the FOI guidelines.
“We have been in a position to present data for this yr as a result of we will test the variety of energetic circumstances nonetheless open and we've got modified the way in which we file these circumstances in future.
“This isn’t concerning the data not being disclosed, it was simply not in a format that we may extract it and there was no means we may get the figures with out going via employees’s particular person information so there is no such thing as a secrecy about it.”