Shamed NHS boss should go, hints Hunt

A SHAMED health boss who presided over a failure to investigate hundreds of unexpected deaths should be sacked or should quit, suggested Jeremy Hunt yesterday.

The Health Secretary said managers who showed a ‘lack of judgment’ should ‘move on’ and not be allowed to ‘resurface somewhere else in the NHS on huge pay packets’.

Katrina Percy – who stepped down as chief executive of Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust this week – was allowed to keep her £240,000 pay package, despite moving to an ‘advisory’ role.

Mr Hunt’s stark criticism followed those of MPs and families of patients let down by the scandal-hit trust, who said she should be sacked. Politicians had also called for an inquiry into why the 42-year- old is being allowed to keep her huge salary for simply advising a handful of GP practices.

Mr Hunt said it was ‘terrible’ that the trust failed to investigate up to 1,259 ‘unexplained’ deaths because they were not deemed serious enough.

Asked about Miss Percy’s new role, he said managers had the ‘ most difficult job’ imaginable balancing patient needs with money but the NHS had to be ‘much better at accountability’. Adding to the growing pressure on Miss Percy, he said: ‘We need to recognise that if someone hasn’t done a good job then they need to move on and we can’t brush these things under the carpet.’

He said there were two situations, one where a manager doing a ‘very difficult job has made a mistake but deserves a second chance’. The second was ‘where they have shown a lack of judgment that shows they are not suitable to be a manager’.

Mr Hunt added: ‘It is very very important that if the public are going to have confidence in the NHS that in that latter case they do not resurface somewhere else in the NHS on huge pay packets.’

He also failed to say he had confidence in the trust, only stating: ‘I do have confidence they are making progress.’ Latest figures show that other managers at Southern Health, which cares for patients with mental health needs and learning difficulties, earn more than the Prime Minister.

Chief operating officer Dr Chris Gordon, 55, and medical director Dr Lesley Stevens, 52, each raked in more than the £143,000 a year Theresa May is paid.

Dr Gordon, who was responsible for inquiries into patient deaths, earned £270,000 over two years and put £472,000 into his pension.

A report has found there were 1,454 unexpected patient deaths in trust care over four years but only 195 were treated as serious.

Yesterday the trust said the situation with Miss Percy’s new role had not changed.