Cancelled Operations
In October 2001 Wendy McCarthy (Click for statement) the Head of Information came to see me in my roll as St George's Board Member for Information that one on her senior managers had reported to her that Kelly Goulding (Click for statement) an Information Analyst had complained that she had been asked by the Trust’s Deputy Chief Executive to report that the number of cancelled operations that had taken place within the hospital during the period 1st to 7th October was nil, even though she had calculated the figure to be 28 and then when she researched the previous week she had found that the figures had been similarly altered without any justification from 42 to zero and then discovered they had been changed from 11 to zero in the following week. Because of the seriousness of the matter I reported by e-mail what had happened to the Chief Executive Ian Hamilton (Click to read the e-mails). You will see from Ian Hamilton's response highlighted in red that he claimed that the figures were changed because of a lack of robustness in the data. In the light of this response I asked Wendy McCarthy to audit the Trusts information systems to ensure that the they were in fact producing accurate data and you can see from the passage in her statement that I have highlighted in red that the information was indeed robust and that she could find no reason for the figures having been changed. Despite having had the figures audited to confirm that Kelly Goulding's complaint was well founded some of my Board colleagues did not feel I had done the right thing in supporting a junior member of staff who had told the truth. Marie Grant the Chief Nurse sent an e-mail to all the executive directors telling them that she was disappointed by my behaviour and that it was important that the staff of the Trust saw the Board speaking with one voice and that I had not performed as a team player. John Parkes the Deputy Chief Executive responded to her e-mail by suggesting that the Trust's management arrangements should be reviewed with a view to taking the managerial responsibility for information away from me. As I found out later at my internal disciplinary hearing Marie Grant and the Medical Director Paul Jones also went privately to see the Chief Executive to complain about my management style. In addition I received an acrimonious phone call from John Parkes a day or so after I had first raised the issue and that he had said to me, how can I rely on you as a fellow Board member if I don’t know what your going to say, if a junior member of staff is going to make a complaint about me. My response to John Parkes was that he would always be able to know what I was going to say, because I was always going to tell the truth regardless of the seniority of the individuals involved in any dispute. More worryingly on the 14th November 2001 the Chairman of the Trust Catherine McLoughlin asked to see me, an extremely rare event as during the three years we had been fellow board members she had almost never asked to see me on my own to discuss any issue. It was at this meeting that I realised that Miss McLoughlin was not interested in the truth, but only how St George's appeared in the eyes of those more senior in the NHS than she. At the meeting Miss McLoughlin asked me if she could speak frankly to me and I said that was something that I would welcome. She then told me that the problem with St George’s Healthcare was me; she told me that it was me and my dammed arrogance. When I asked her to explain what she meant by that, she said that I maybe the finance director but that I did not know the hospital as a user and that she could not stand the fact that I ate boiled sweets. I said that I was surprised that she should say that I did not know the hospital, when my two younger sons had been born at St George’s, my two older sons had been regular outpatient attendees at the hospitals dental unit for many years, that my grandfather had died at the Bollingbroke Hospital, that my only paternal uncle had died on Benjamin Brodie Ward and that my wife and father were both currently undergoing treatment at St George’s, my father for bladder cancer and my wife for a blood disorder. I further told Miss McLoughlin that the fact that I sometimes sucked boiled sugar sweets was on the advice of my GP because he suspected that I had a low blood sugar level and that I had done this for twenty years and no one had ever complained about this before. Miss McLoughlin said that she did not know any of this and I remember saying to her at the time that was she was making judgements about me without knowing anything about me at all, because during the relatively short time she had been Chairman she had never taken the time to speak to me outside of formal meetings. Miss McLoughlin then went on to say that the real point of our discussion was that in her opinion I was not getting on with my fellow executive directors and why did I think that was? It was at this point that I told her that in my view the reasons tensions had arisen was because I had informed my colleagues about the fact that I had received a complaint via Wendy McCarthy the Trust’s head of information that a junior member of staff, Kelly Goulding had complained that she had been asked by the Trust’s Deputy Chief Executive to report that the number of cancelled operations that had taken place within the hospital during that proceeding week was nil, even though she had calculated the figure to be 28 and then when she researched the previous week she had found that the figures had been similarly altered without any justification from 42 to zero and then discovered they had been changed from 11 to zero in the following week. I told Miss McLoughin that when I had reported this matter to the Chief Executive, that the reaction I had received from my board colleagues had not been favourable at all and I told Miss McLoughlin about the phone call with John Parkes. Miss McLoughlin’s response was to tell me very forcibly that she was not interested in my excuses and that in her view my actions and arrogant attitude were causing a severe problem within the Trust’s senior management team and that she held me responsible for having created that tension and that in future she expected me to support my board colleagues. On page five of the first statement that she submitted to the Employment Tribunal, Miss McLoughlin claimed that she did not remember this meeting ever having taken place. I am not surprised that Miss McLoughlin initially denied that this meeting had taken place, as it was at this meeting that I told her about the fraudulent reporting of the cancelled operations figures and I do not think it a coincidence that only a couple of weeks after I raised the issue with my board colleagues that I was summoned to see the Chairman of the Trust for probably the only occasion during the entire time that we worked together without it being related to a formal specific meeting at which others were present. While Miss McLoughlin may claim that she does not remember the meeting, it had a major impact on me, so much so, that when I returned to my office I related much of what had been said to me to my Personal Assistant Janet Watson (Click To Read Janet Watson's statement). In a subsequent statement to the Employment Tribunal y Miss McLouglin changed her story and subsequently agreed that the meeting had taken place, but had in fact been about a wholly unrelated issue. Strange that while apparently it was a meeting should could not originally remember ever having been at, when confronted with the evidence to prove that it did indeed take place she could then remember clearly what it was about.
The post script to the issue of the Cancelled Operations issue was that on Thursday 25th July the Hospital Ratings were announced by the Department of Health and St George's Healthcare NHS Trust were awarded a "Two Star Rating". The only thing that stopped St George's becoming a "Three Star" rated Trust was it's failure to achieve the performance target for Cancelled Operations. On the 29th July I was called to Ian Hamilton's office and asked to resign from my post as Finance Director and told if I did not disciplinary action would be taken against me to dismiss me from my post. Also on that day as was revealed during the Employment Tribunal Miss McCloughlin met with KPMG a firm of management consultants and told them that "She wanted an exit strategy in place for Ian Perkin by the end of July 2002". I leave you to judge whether you agree with me that what was happening here was that at least in part I was being punished for having raised the issue of the fraudulent cancelled operations and that what the Chief Executive was doing by asking me to resign was simply to carry out the orders of a vengeful Chairman.