Claims bullying at Perth College is 'brushed under the carpet'
A former support staff worker is speaking to Tay News after the results of an internal staff survey were leaked
Last updated 7th Apr 2021
A former Perth College worker's claiming issues of bullying are 'brushed under the carpet' by senior management.
Results of an internal staff survey were made public nearly two weeks ago.
It found more than a quarter of respondents have been bullied at some point.
Unison says this should raise a red flag for bosses.
One person who wishes to remain anonymous and spent more than decade at the institution is telling Tay News they were signed off for over a year with mental health issues after raising concerns about their boss.
"they couldn't give a monkey’s"
"I was really quite ill at one point. My husband had to call an ambulance, I had a massive panic attack over the whole situation, it caused a lot of stress in my life," they said.
"The senior management team don't care. They say our employees are on their mind, their health and wellbeing.
"That's a load of rubbish, they couldn't give a monkey’s. They didn't check up on me, HR are meant to be neutral in the situation but they weren't, they were totally for the college.
"Everyone was getting signed off or leaving. They know fine well what the problem is. They just don't want to know. I raised my concerns to the assistant principle and he told me he was only there to speak about me."
Just under 280 workers completed the survey which also asked them if they've been harassed in the workplace.
More than 40% reported personal harassment. Just over a quarter stated this was seldom, around 10% said it happened sometimes and just below 5% often or always.
Of the quarter of respondents who reported cases of bullying, 17.3% said it was seldom, 6.5% sometimes, 1.8% often and 0.7% always.
Local steward at Unison, Jane Edwards said: "This is a culture where bullying is allowed to exists, rather than a particular or a couple of individuals inherently deciding to bully their staff.
"More work needs to be done from the leadership team to proactively say we are anti-bullying organisation, we will not tolerate bullying.
"We want you to come forward and report bullying and you will be protected if you come forward and report bullying."
Dr Margaret Cook, Principal Perth College UHI said, “We recognise this has been a challenging year for all staff and we undertook a stress survey to evaluate how our staff were coping during these times.
"We have received some very positive feedback and also responses that we are working hard with colleagues on our Health & wellbeing Group to address through the development of a responsive action plan which will be shared with staff.
"The purpose of these internal staff surveys are to support staff in a positive manner and improve any areas identified to help staff wellbeing.
"We regularly offer resources, a weekly update and opportunity for open dialogue in order to support our college community.
"I would like to reiterate that we do not tolerate bullying and that the health, safety and wellbeing of our staff and students is of utmost importance to us at Perth College UHI - particularly considering the level of effort, commitment and professionalism that has been made over the last year to continue to deliver our core remit of providing learning opportunities.”