BELFAST HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE TRUST
ENVIRONMENTAL CLEANLINESS STRATEGY
November 2007
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BELFAST HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE TRUST
1.0
INTRODUCTION
In October 2005 the Health Minister launched “Cleanliness Matters”, a regional
three-year strategy for improving the Standards of Environmental Cleanliness in
all Health and Personal Social Services organizations and facilities. This was
followed by the introduction of the Environmental Cleanliness Controls Assurance
Standard, which provides a framework detailing the systems and processes
required to ensure continuous improvement of environmental cleanliness in
Health and Personal Social Services facilities.
In May 2007 the Department of Health and Social Services and Public Safety
issued revised guidance on the implementation of the Environmental Cleanliness
Strategy.
The Belfast HSC Trust welcomes these initiatives that detail objective regional
standards to enable the Trust to measure improvements in the quality of service.
This strategy has been developed taking cognisance of the Trust’s Quality
Objective and the following four key principles:
→ To meet patient/client needs;
→ To ensure a quality culture and style in the organisation;
→ To improve staff training and communication;
→ To find new ways of ensuring continuous improvement in service delivery.
In addition, this strategy should be read and implemented in conjunction with the
following key Trust documents:
→ Board Assurance Framework
→ Infection Prevention and Control Strategy and Action Plan
→ Estates Strategy
→ Capital Utilisation and Investment Plan.
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BELFAST HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE TRUST
2.0 BACKGROUND AND CURRENT POSITION
In the early 1990s Legacy Trusts cleaning services were competitively tendered
using model input based cleaning specifications provided by the Eastern Health
and Social Services Board. It was recognized that these specifications could not