Senior doctor at Whangārei Hospital sacked over ‘flirty’ texts to junior must pay $18k

A senior doctor has been ordered to pay $18k in costs. Photo / 123RF

A senior hospital doctor fired after sending flirty texts to a junior has been ordered to pay $18,000 in costs after a drawn-out employment dispute.

The doctor was sacked in May 2021 from his job at Whangārei Hospital because of medical incapacity which followed 10 months of being on sick leave.

Prior to his dismissal, he had carried on a flirtatious text exchange with a younger woman until she complained after becoming uncomfortable working with him.

At one point the male doctor told the woman: “If you look at me with that cheeky smile, you could get whatever you want.”

Before his sick leave, he was on four months’ special leave while Northland District Health Board investigated a complaint of sexual harassment from a female junior doctor.

The Employment Relations Authority [ERA] said in a ruling from March that the DHB, now Te Whatu Ora, did not breach any duty of good faith with the doctor, who claimed he’d been unjustifiably dismissed.

Events unfolded in April 2020 after a registrar with whom the senior medical officer had been communicating via text – some of it “cheeky” and “flirty” – lodged a sexual harassment complaint.

The doctor, whose name is suppressed, admitted the exchanges between him and the registrar who at times reported to him, and that at some stage the boundary had become blurred.

The man said as the pair sent responses and read the replies the repartee became more risque.

He conceded during the investigation that he had crossed a line but admitted to being shocked when confronted with the news a complaint had been laid.

The doctor told the ERA that he was “embarrassed” about his conduct.

However, as the DHB came to its preliminary decision that the doctor’s actions were serious misconduct he became unwell and was admitted to hospital for a stress-induced illness.

The DHB engaged a cardiologist and psychiatrist to assess the doctor as they looked into his ability to return to work and both specialists found he had stress-related heart problems relating to the complaint.

The health board determine the doctor would not be returning to work soon unless the disciplinary process was scrapped so in April 2021, he was informed of a preliminary decision to end his employment for reasons around medical incapacity.

Months later the doctor claimed he had been unjustifiably dismissed, and unjustifiably disadvantaged by the investigation, along with a claim the DHB breached its duty of good faith.

But the ERA held an investigation meeting in November 2022 and member Eleanor Robinson ruled the health board had acted appropriately.

The DHB sought $71,900 in legal fee costs incurred by the employment dispute.

The board said it tried to offer the senior doctor an out-of-court settlement four times, with the final amount reaching $42,500 and $8000 for legal fees but was refused.

Furthermore, the DHB said the vast majority of legal fees would have been avoided if he had acted appropriately and accepted the offer.

Robinson agreed, in an ERA decision released last week, that the doctor should shoulder some of the costs despite his unemployment thus she awarded costs of $18,000.