Two elected governors have been suspended, pending investigation, by the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay Foundation Trust (UHMBT).
Computer Weekly understands the pair were told by the trust’s chair, Mike Thomas, that they were being suspended on the same day as they were due to raise questions around disputed emails that appeared to implicate whistleblowing medic and ex-trust employee, Peter Duffy, in a string of clinical errors which led to the death of a patient at a UHMBT hospital in January 2015.
Thomas, however, told Computer Weekly that the suspensions were not related to concerns around the disputed emails.
He said it was “inaccurate and wrong” to suggest “the decision to suspend two public governors was directly related to any single incident and specifically concerns raised around emails found during the independent investigation into the Trust’s urology services."
In late May, the General Medical Council (GMC), which acts as the chief watchdog for UK doctors, dropped a 30-month probe into Duffy over the contents of the emails. But Duffy maintains the emails could still put him in the frame for potentially criminal charges.
The two governors were due to raise questions at the 20 June meeting around conflicting evidence in respect of the emails - which had apparently been sent by Duffy during the days leading up to the 2015 death of 76-year-old Morecambe man Peter Read, but did not appear until 2020.
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