The Health and Social Care Committee has launched a new inquiry to examine
leadership, performance and patient safety in the NHS.
MPs will consider the work of the Messenger review (2022) which
examined the state of leadership and management in the NHS and
social care, and the Kark review (2019) which assessed how
effectively the fit and proper persons test prevents unsuitable
staff from being redeployed or re-employed in health and social
care settings.
The Committee’s inquiry will also consider how effectively
leadership supports whistleblowers and what is learnt from
patient safety issues.
An ongoing evaluation by the Committee’s Expert Panel on progress by government in
meeting recommendations on patient safety will provide
further information to the inquiry.
Health and Social Care Committee Chair said:
“The role of leadership within the NHS is crucial whether that be
a driver of productivity that delivers efficient services for
patients and in particular when it comes to patient safety.
“Five years ago, Tom Kark QC led a review to ensure that
directors in the NHS responsible for quality and safety of care
are ‘fit and proper’ to be in their roles. We’ll be questioning
what impact that has made.
“We’ll also look at recommendations from the Messenger review to
strengthen leadership and management and we will ask whether NHS
leadership structures provide enough support to whistleblowers.
“Our Expert Panel has already begun its work to evaluate
government progress on accepted recommendations to improve
patient safety so this will build on that. We owe it to those who
rely on the NHS – and the tax-payers who pay for it – to know
whether the service is well led and those who have been failed on
patient safety need to find out whether real change has resulted
from promises made.”
ENDS
TERMS OF REFERENCE:
The Committee invites written submissions addressing any, or all,
of the following points, but please note that the Committee does
not investigate individual cases and will not be pursuing matters
on behalf of individuals. Evidence should be submitted
by Friday 8 March. Written evidence can be submitted here of no more than 3,000
words.
- How effectively does NHS leadership encourage a culture in
which staff feel confident raising patient safety concerns, and
what more could be done to support this?
- What has been the impact of the 2019 Kark Review on
leadership in the NHS as it relates to patient safety?
- What progress has been made to date on recommendations from
the 2022 Messenger Review?
- How effectively have leadership recommendations from previous
reviews of patient safety crises been implemented?
- How could better regulation of health service managers and
application of agreed professional standards support improvements
in patient safety?
- How effectively do NHS leadership structures provide a
supportive and fair approach to whistleblowers, and how could
this be improved?
- How could investigations into whistleblowing complaints be
improved?
- How effectively does the NHS complaints system prevent
patient safety incidents from escalating and what would be the
impact of proposed measures to improve patient safety, such as
Martha’s Rule?
- What can the NHS learn from the leadership culture in other
safety-critical sectors e.g. aviation, nuclear?
