St John WA boss Kevin Brown addresses staff following job cut announcement expected to impact more than 60

St John WA chief executive officer Kevin Brown has finally fronted up to staff in a “fiery” meeting four days after they found out about 60 jobs would be impacted at the ambulance service. Mr Brown addressed employees on Monday morning after a memo was sent around the organisation on Thursday notifying the axe would be wielded due to a “more constrained economic environment”. Sources inside the meeting described it as “pretty fiery” and said “a lot of people are angry”. One attendee apparently “slammed” the CEO and threatened to resign on the spot. Another asked why the St John WA brand team was handing out stickers at a skate park, while people were being fired. “Why aren’t we screaming from the rooftops about appropriate funding,” said another. Kevin Brown told gathered staff that the cuts were necessary because the economic climate has changed. Around 63 people are likely to be impacted according to St John WA, less than the previously estimated 90. An organisation spokeswoman said 21 people have already been offered redeployment and work was still being done to work through other vacant positions. The spokeswoman said Mr Brown’s talk to staff addressed next steps for impacted employees. “Mr Brown discussed that redeployment options, transition support and career counselling have been offered to affected employees and acknowledged the contribution of every individual impacted,” she said. The West Australian requested an interview with Mr Brown to explain the decision to the public but the request was declined. According to the company, frontline services will not be impacted by the move. Despite this, a paramedic who spoke to The West Australian in the wake of the memo on the condition of anonymity said morale had already suffered and rebutted the idea frontline services wouldn’t be impacted by the changes. While the St John WA spokeswoman did not directly address the paramedic’s claims when asked by The West Australian, she said it was an “understandably difficult period for the entire team”. The St John WA spokeswoman said the organisation acknowledged the contribution of those impacted but affirmed there’d be no changes to frontline services. “St John WA can confirm it is undertaking a limited reduction in workforce numbers as part of an organisational reset,” she said. “This change affects about 2 per cent of our paid workforce, primarily across support and enabling functions. “The decision reflects current economic pressures and the need to ensure long-term sustainability. “Our focus remains on delivering safe, high-quality frontline services and maintaining the systems and infrastructure that support them.” The spokeswoman said the organisation’s manager for State Control Centre and Operations would stay unchanged while other leadership roles would shift. “Other leadership changes in our State Control & Logistics team will enable improved integration and innovation with the Department of Health’s State Health Operations Centre, which has evolved rapidly in the last 12 months,” she said. On Monday morning, Health Minister Meredith Hammat repeated the line she said last week, that staffing decisions were a matter for St John WA. She said her department would continue to monitor the situation. “This is really a matter for St John’s, their commitment to us is that it won’t have an impact on the services that they’re delivering under our contract for the West Australian community,” she said. “The Department of Health will monitor that very closely and of course, we will keep a close eye on that, because it is such an important part of our healthcare system and we need to make sure that the community has confidence of the work that they’re doing.”