Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
The Royal Free Hospital is to lose 480 jobs in a bid to save £25m, it has been announced. The north London hospital, which has a £16m overspend, said it will try to keep redundancies to a minimum but could not rule them out. At the Royal Free, the £25m savings is made up of the £16m overspend, meeting a 2.5% government efficiency target and £10m in increased salaries, costs of drugs and equipment. The overspend must be paid back by the end of the next financial year because all trusts must repay accumulated deficits within five years. Andrew Way, chief executive of the trust, said: "These measures are not exceptional and are designed to bring the Royal Free into line with other organisations.
"We must achieve financial balance if we are to control our own future as the government has made it very clear that they will not bail out organisations which fail to do so."
Eurofound (2006), Royal Free Hospital, Internal restructuring in United Kingdom, factsheet number 63220, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/63220.