Starship Hospital nurses, doctors boycotted managers over bullying allegations

Nurses and doctors at Starship Hospital's unit for abused children spent months boycotting dealings with management over years of repeated allegations of harassment and bullying.

RNZ has reported on multiple allegations of bullying and harassment of staff at Starship unit Te Puaruruhau.

One former worker told RNZ it has become a lesser service.

The small unit has had its senior doctor numbers drop from eight to four, lost two Māori roles and its psychologist, according to the nurses and senior doctors' unions and informed sources. In all but one case this was directly linked to the "toxic" environment, they said.

It now has no permanent clinical director at the helm. Health NZ said on Friday it was recruiting to fill the top and other roles.

Health New Zealand interim chief human resources officer Robyn Shearer told Morning Report on Friday: "The service has probably been challenged by some staff vacancies, and people who've left and new people who've come in."

Documents seen by RNZ show 11 staff were involved in a cessation notice that kicked in at the end of January 2025 this year. Eleven doctors and nurses kept doing their jobs but boycotted any interactions with management.

It came after investigations into the problems at Te Puaruruhau, firstly by a King's Counsel lawyer and then by external consultant, Three60 Consult.

'Nothing has improved'

The boycott underlined how bad things had got.

"Trust was eroded," said the ex-staffer.

The cessation notice stated it was "unsafe" for staff to carry on.

"Some members of the Te Puaruruhau team have been subjected to repeated harassment and bullying... Although other members of the team have not been directly impacted by these behaviours, they feel they can no longer stand by and witness the harm done to others, and to the team functioning," it said.

"The persistent and unreasonable behaviours have significantly impacted upon individual and team wellbeing, with detrimental effects to our mental health, our families, and our job satisfaction, up to and including resignation.

"Senior management have been aware of this situation since December 2022 and, despite a prolonged investigation, nothing has improved. We followed up in September and December meetings in 2024 with senior management as nothing happened. In addition, a formal health and safety plea was sent in December 2024 but no adequate control measures have been put in place."

Health NZ responded in a letter to the unions by seeking an urgent meeting and asking them to withdraw the notice.

"The notice may be a form of unlawful strike action and a breach of good faith by ASMS, NZNO [unions] and the individual workers," the Auckland district's group director of operations told them.

It reserved the right to act against the unions and individual employees, the letter said.

It also stated the "issues are long standing", were being worked on by an external facilitator. Also,  HNZ objected that the staffers' cessation notice "contains no details of the risks".

The 11 workers went ahead with the boycott, while keeping doing their jobs, through to changes in management in May, according to the unions.

'People were frightened'

Documents show the hospital told doctors and nurses in late 2024 that interim measures to protect them were in place, restating that in April 2025.

However, in April 2025, Starship Hospital director Dr Greg Williams said in an email the "proposed" controls had been blocked while negotiations went on.

Meantime, a health and safety rep from the main hospital was emailing the top of management to intervene - 10 times in February and March this year.

At one stage, the Health Commissioner's office sent him a two-line reply, saying the matters were being taken "extremely seriously, and that work is underway to address the issues. On that basis, I am sure that ... one of the senior team at Te Toka Tumai  [Auckland district]  will be in touch with you."

The health and safety rep contacted HNZ's Health Integrity Line three times, asking the national office to step in, only to find out later the line had been defunct since its co-ordinator was made redundant in November 2024.

Documents show workers also upset about the KC's investigation, by lawyer Maria Dew, done in 2023-4 and accompanied by a "culture review".

After a five-month wait to see the 70-page report, they only got a 30-page summary and parts of that were blanked out, the ex-staffer and other sources said.

"It was a big investigation," said the ex-staffer. Over 40 people were interviewed, she said.

"It would have been financially exorbitant."

'We are committed'

This week,  Williams listed for RNZ five ways in which Health NZ had responded: With extra health and safety reps, better whistleblowing pathways and staff support, workshops and an updated risk framework.  

"We are committed to providing a safe, respectful workplace and have taken a range of actions in response to staff concerns and the resulting improvement notice," Williams said.

"We're working closely with Worksafe to meet all requirements of the improvement notice on time."

Shearer told Morning Report the long-running concerns of staff weren't acted on quickly enough or adequately.

Asked twice if she accepted bullying had happened, Shearer said, "Concerns were raised by staff members. They were acted on and they felt that they weren't adequately addressed.

"We recognise this wasn't an adequate response. All of our work since then has been to ensure that we haven't repeated this situation.

"When staff raise concerns I expect them to be escalated appropriately and in a timely way."

This comes at least 11 months after a series stopgap measures were put in that HNZ said would protect staff, who said they failed to do that, the documents show.

The Nurses Organisation and Association of Salaried Medical Specialists union both said they see little sign so far the new measures being put in to meet the Worksafe notice would fix things.

Two workshops held in August with managers and staff were tense, sources said.

Shearer said the reporting systems were better now.

Regards rebuilding the unit, Shearer said new people had joined the unit recently. RNZ has asked for more information about that.

"Some staff have left, and new staff have joined," she said.

"We've got active recruitment underway ... And we have interim arrangements for management currently in place."

The ex-staffer told RNZ the ructions had led to a "lesser" service for children.

RNZ understands new health and safety reps have been elected at the unit, but not trained. Only trained reps have authority under the law.

RNZ has repeatedly asked if Health New Zealand has taken the basic step of investigating to uphold the bullying complaints or otherwise, but it has not said.

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