Hunt lauded boss of hospital trust that faces deaths inquiry

The boss of a scandal-hit hospital at the centre of a police investigation was lauded by Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, as having done a “sensational job” of keeping patients safe.

Dame Marianne Griffiths stepped down as chief executive of University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust in 2022.

Police are now investigating more than 100 cases of alleged negligence in the latter years of her tenure, amid allegations of a cover-up and the persecution of whistleblowers.

Despite this, Dame Marianne has gone on to secure further top-level NHS work, as well as being honoured outside the health service with an appointment as chancellor of the University of Chichester.

During her time in charge at the Sussex trust, she was praised for improving standards of patient safety by Mr Hunt, who was health secretary from 2012 to 2018, and subsequently chaired the Commons’ health and social care select committee.

Upon Dame Marianne’s retirement from the trust, Mr Hunt said: “My passion was improving safety and quality of NHS care.

“Marianne did an absolutely sensational job of putting together the best-run, safest, highest-quality care that I encountered anywhere in the NHS.

“Thousands and thousands of patients benefited because of your inspirational leadership.”

His 2022 commendation is still displayed prominently on the trust’s website.

Mr Hunt has also previously shared a platform with Dame Marianne, who received her damehood in 2020, on the subject of patient safety.

Originally a nurse, Dame Marianne became in 2018 the first woman to be named best chief executive in the NHS at the influential Health Service Journal awards, an accolade she retained the following year.

However, the trust’s reputation as a centre for good practice and that of its flagship hospital, The Royal Sussex in Brighton, is now in tatters.

Last year, the Care Quality Commission rated the trust “inadequate”, with complaints by staff of “autocratic and bureaucratic” management, and “little or no improvement in surgery” since a previous inspection in 2021.

It is also facing cases in an employment tribunal by two whistleblowers who claim that a group of senior hospital consultants suppressed warnings about patient safety for years.

Mansoor Foroughi, a leading consultant neurosurgeon, and Krishna Singh, a general surgeon, have claimed that they told Dame Marianne, as well as her chief medical officer, that patients were dying unnecessarily almost five years before police became involved last May.

University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust told the tribunal that Mr Foroughi’s complaints were made in bad faith to further his own career, and that it had followed due process dismissing him and Mr Singh.

The tribunal has been halted pending police investigation and both claimants stand by their claims.

Chief was paid £3.7 million

The Telegraph has also revealed claims that significant numbers of unregistered consultants were allowed to operate on patients, with Sussex taking advantage of looser rules for foundation trusts, which allow doctors who have not completed the rigorous consultant qualification process to act up in the role.

This is understood to form part of an investigation by Sussex Police into at least 105 cases of alleged medical negligence.

Dame Marianne reportedly earned £3.7 million between 2009 and 2022, accruing a pension pot of nearly £1.3 million.

Although concerns about the treatment of patients at Sussex were already emerging, in August 2022 Dame Marianne was appointed by NHS England to lead its independent review of failings at North East Ambulance Service, which was facing similar allegations of cover-ups and the mistreatment of whistleblowers, following a number of deaths.

The review, which cost taxpayers around £200,000 as of last summer, found cultural and behavioural issues that contributed to the failings.

However, Dame Marianne concluded that the ambulance service’s current leadership were the right people to bring about reform.

NHS England would not disclose what Dame Marianne was paid for conducting the review.

A senior clinician at the Royal Sussex, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “A lot of us feel very strongly that she shouldn’t play any further role in the NHS given what’s happened here.

“It sometimes feels like there’s an alternative universe for top executives, with patients and staff living in the real world.”

The police investigation at the Royal Sussex is one of the most significant criminal investigations into an NHS institution in recent decades.

It comes amid heightened scrutiny of how the health service reacts to staff raising concerns following the conviction of Lucy Letby last year.

The paediatric nurse was found guilty of murdering seven infants and the attempted murder of seven others at the Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015 and 2016.

Some of the deaths occurred after staff, one a senior consultant, voiced serious concerns.

However, they allege that the trust sought to downplay their concerns and even threatened them with disciplinary action.

A major focus of Mr Hunt’s six years as health secretary was patient safety and making it easier for staff to speak up.

He frequently spoke of his desire to move away from a culture of blame to one of learning from mistakes, as practised in the aviation industry.

Some reforms were introduced. However, as the high volume of doctors’ unfair dismissal claims currently being heard by the employment tribunals show, whistleblowers are still routinely sidelined and disciplined after speaking up.

Many are also referred by their trust, or former trust, to the General Medical Council for professional misconduct allegations, imperilling their licence to practise.

This happened in the case of Mr Foroughi, who initially raised concerns about 19 deaths and 23 cases of serious harm.

The Telegraph has previously revealed that in 2019 there was a major shake-up of clinical governance within the general surgery department at the Royal Sussex, which reduced the frequency of morbidity and mortality meetings.

The purpose of such meetings is to discuss deaths and complications in order to learn lessons.

Dr George Findlay, a long-term protege of Dame Marianne, took over as chief executive of University Hospitals Sussex in June 2022, having previously served as deputy chief executive and chief medical officer in Western Sussex Hospital and Brighton and Sussex University Hospital, which became part of the same trust.

An NHS spokesman said: “NHS England commissioned Dame Marianne Griffiths to lead the review into North East Ambulance Service following a process to identify a person with relevant NHS experience and who had not worked in the local area.”

Dame Marianne has made no public statements since the announcement of the police investigation.