Sir James Cochrane Chairman South West London Strategic Health Authority
James Cochrane was until January 2001 a Director of Glaxo Wellcome plc with responsibility for international operations. He is a non-executive director of a major distribution company, and he is a board member of two universities. In January 2002 it was reported that he had been one of only fourteen company directors that had received a "golden hand shake" of over £1million.
He was appointed as Chairman of the South West London Strategic Health Authority in December 2001 and it was in that capacity that I wrote to him in December 2002 to point out to him that I had been fairly dismissed and asking him whether he had any prior knowledge of that dismissal and what action he would take to prevent this sort of thing happening in the future. Following the usual pattern when I raised my case with anyone more senior than myself in the NHS, I did not receive the courtesy of a reply from Sir James, Julie Dent the South West London Strategic Health Authority Chief Executive stating when she replied to a letter I sent her that she was replying on his behalf. Again senior officials in the NHS were hardly queuing up to support a "whistleblower", who had indicated that he had been unfairly treated.