Rewarding Failure
The lack of basic care is the biggest scandal to come out of the inquiry into Mid Staffordshire Hospital - where up to 1,200 patients died unnecessarily between 2005 and 2008 - see post dated 4 February 2013 'Hospital Trip Advisor'.
I will be very interested to read the full inquiry report when it is published later today - but so far all I've heard on the airwaves is one person after the other pointing the finger elsewhere - with many of them doing so anonymously.
Now I find all these anonymous claims quite astonishing - because the NHS is one of the most highly unionised industries in the UK - with big, powerful trade unions which are able to speak up on behalf of their members.
So where have all the union voices been over recent years - not with wild, exaggerated claims, but with detailed evidence and clear examples - of where and why hospital services have been failing patients and the public?
As so often happens in these situations the people who should be providing answers - the most senior managers - have departed the scene and in many cases have gone on to other well-paid positions, elsewhere in the NHS.
Take the former chief executive of Mid Staffs NHS Trust - Martin Yeates - who left his job “by mutual agreement” - but with with a £400,000 pay off which included £80,000 in lieu of his normal notice period.
Martin Yeates did not give evidence to the subsequent public inquiry - on the grounds that he was too unwell to do so, apparently - yet the investigation has been ongoing for years.
The focus of the public inquiry is on the treatment of patients, quite rightly, but another scandal is the way in which senior managers in our public services routinely walk away from their already high paid jobs with film star pensions and eye-watering, lump sums and often tax-free pay offs.
The fact is that huge sums of public money are being thrown at senior people in our public services - who simply do not deserve such generous treatment.
When those at the very top of an organisation are rewarded so handsomely despite their evident lack of leadership - it's hardly surprising that others become disenchanted and cynical.
