Staff at Our Lady's join protest

The staff in Our Lady's Hospital in Navan turned out in droves for Monday's protest, despite having received assurances about their jobs.

"We need a fully functioning A&E in Navan, which is why joined the protest," said shop steward, Ann Rochford.

There had been widespread concern among staff when the news broke two weeks ago that the new protocol would be implemented this week, as staff hadn't been briefed by management.

However, Ms Rochford said this week that they had now been give reassurances that there would be no redundancies or redeployments as a result of the changes.

"We still went out in our droves to protest. We want Minister Donnelly to pump investment into Navan. We all have families here in Meath and we want a fully functioning Emergency Department in Navan.

"People are worried sick. We have a population of over 200,000 in Meath and new houses going up every day. We need to keep our emergency department. We need to pump money into it and make it safe," she said.