GPs have to Promote Whistleblowing - Shipman Inquiry
9 December 2004
The Shipman Inquiry has strongly recommended today that all GPs should promote whistleblowing and ensure that their staff know how to raise concerns about patient safety. Public Concern at Work, the whistleblowing charity, welcomes these recommendations and the findings of the 5th Report of the Shipman Inquiry.
“The recommendations of the Shipman Inquiry will go a long way to providing staff in GP practices with a safe alternative to silence where patient safety is at risk” says Anna Myers, Deputy Director of Public Concern at Work. “The Shipman Inquiry has properly identified the considerable progress the NHS has already made towards creating a culture in which staff feel confident to warn managers about wrongdoing and malpractice. But clearly more needs to be done. We welcome the Shipman Inquiry’s recommendations which will go a long way towards embedding a culture of responsibility and accountability through to primary care - which after all is where most patients’ experience of the NHS lies.”
Public Concern at Work believes that, wherever possible, it is in the best interests of staff, employers and the public interest that any concern about patient safety is raised early and addressed locally, in the knowledge that external oversight can be readily invoked. The Shipman Inquiry’s recommendations will encourage staff to raise their concerns with their immediate managers and help those managers respond effectively to concerns. This can only help GPs do their jobs better.
View the Shipman Inquiry’s recommendations on whistleblowing in the NHS.
View Public Concern at Work’s evidence to The Shipman Inquiry