A consultant has won a landmark whistleblowing victory against NHS managers who tried to silence him when he spoke out against cuts.
Ramon Niekrash, a consultant urologist at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in south London, told Hospital Dr he hopes his case will now act as a “big stick” to deter other trusts from bullying their critics.
He has also criticised the amount of taxpayers’ money that the trust wasted in pursuing their vendetta against him.
“Managers used substantial amounts of taxpayers’ money with no accountability to silence a critic who in actual fact was trying to defend and support the patient. The taxpayers’ money hasn’t gone towards medical care it has been spent on silencing me.”
Niekrash was branded a troublemaker and suspended for ten weeks after he repeatedly raised concerns about patient safety.
An industrial tribunal has now ruled that his treatment, specifically his exclusion from the hospital, was in breach of whistleblowing legislation.
In a series of letters from 2005 Niekrash raised concerns about the closure of a urology ward; a cut in the number of specialist urology nurses; hospital acquired infections; the health and safety of patients and the trust’s clinical governance obligations.
He also complained about his contract and the job planning process and made allegations of widespread bullying and harassment in the surgical directorate in an attempt to achieve cost cuts.
The vast majority of letters received no response which prompted him to write further letters.
When he was suspended the medical staffing committee threatened to hold a vote of no confidence in the management which resulted in Niekrash being reinstated after ten weeks.
The tribunal ruled that letters written by the trust around the time of Niekrash’s whistleblowing were defamatory. It also found he suffered loss of reputation and private practice and injury to health and feelings as a result of his suspension. A separate hearing will decide on the level of compensation he will be awarded.
Niekrash said he had had to pursue the case in order to protect his reputation and because it was his moral duty as a doctor to protect his patients.
“I genuinely believed there was a moral issue. I did nothing for any pecuniary interest other than that which was genuinely for the benefit of the patient,” he said.
Arpita Dutt, partner at Russell Jones & Walker, who represented Niekrash, said it was difficult for a whistleblower to win a case because the legalities were complex. This meant any successful whistleblowing case was a landmark because it exposed issues in public services that were of wider interest to the general public.
Dutt said: “This case is also is a salient warning because we are in times of public spending cuts and we are seeing A&E departments and wards threatened with closure so there is likely to be an increase in this sort of tension that gives rise to whistleblowing.
“This means we have to be on guard for employers and NHS trusts taking this sort of attitude to whistleblowers. This case certainly sends out a strong message that should resonate throughout all public services.”
A South London Healthcare NHS Trust spokesperson pointed out that the incidents took place prior to the establishment in April 2009 of South London Healthcare NHS Trust, which now manages the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.
She said: “There are lessons to be learned from this case and the new trust absolutely believes in the importance of whistleblowing and encourages any staff members with concerns about patient safety to bring them to the attention of their managers straight away. We now have an environment and the correct processes in place so staff can feel confident that they can raise concerns without any fear. We are assured that the issues which led to this case would not have occurred under the new trust management.”