Dr Ravi Jayaram has described a “culture of cover-up” he believes has major implications for all institutions, not just the health service, and said many employees are too scared to speak out for “fear of personal harm and retribution”.
An NHS consultant at the hospital where Lucy Letby murdered seven babies has warned the health service is “almost guaranteeing” another big scandal if whistleblowers are not offered more protection.
Dr Ravi Jayaram, a consultant paediatrician at the Countess of Chester Hospital where Letby killed the babies and attempted to murder six more, says “the system is stacked against the whistleblower”.
The nurse was able to carry out her crimes after the concerns of whistleblowers at the hospital were ignored. It also emerged managers there took 11 months to involve police after suspicions were raised.
In an interview with Sky News, Dr Jayaram backs proposed reform to whistleblowing legislation as part of a private members bill which is due its second reading in the Commons on Friday.
It calls for an independent “Office of the Whistleblower”, which would offer more protection to all members of the public.
“If things stay the same, then the behaviours will stay the same,” Dr Jayaram says, “there will continue to be times when people are too scared to raise concerns for fear of personal harm and retribution.”
He describes a general “culture of cover-up” with “major implications” for not just healthcare, and patient safety, but “across all institutions”.
“By not acting now we’re almost guaranteeing another big NHS scandal… another revelation such as Shrewsbury and Telford, such as the Post Office.”
Currently whistleblowing in the UK is protected by the Public Interest Disclosure Act (PIDA), which was introduced 25 years ago.
It allows a whistleblower to seek compensation through an employment tribunal if they suffer a detriment because of raising concerns.
It has, however, been criticised for being costly and not addressing or forcing investigations into the reasons behind the whistleblowing.
Georgina Halford-Hall, director of the WhistleblowersUK not-for-profit organisation that supports whistleblowers, says existing legislation “turns a serious concern that might be about the death of babies, or massive fraud, into a simple dispute between an employer and a worker”.
“The allegations get lost somewhere in the system.”
“Currently legislation incentivises wrongdoing because nobody’s held to account,” she continues, adding that if the law had changed years ago the Post Office scandal may never have happened.
“We know that there were whistleblowers at the Post Office. We know there were whistleblowers across all of the hospitals, and nobody is listening to them.”