Ex-CQC Executive Denies Cover-Up Claims

The former Deputy Chief Executive of the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has said she was not involved in a decision to delete a critical internal review.

Last week, an independent report into the CQC's investigation into the deaths of a number of babies at Furness General Hospital found evidence of a possible cover-up. A decision was then made to name those involved in the potential suppressing of the review, and this included former deputy chief executive Jill Finney, then-chief executive Cynthia Bower and media manager Anna Jefferson.

The regulator had given the hospital, which is run by Morecambe Bay NHS Trust, a clean bill of health in 2010, but an internal review was eventually ordered by the CQC in 2011 into how the deaths and injuries had gone unnoticed.

The review was not made public and accountants Grant Thornton claim this is because it was 'too critical' of the CQC.

Grant Thornton added the decision to suppress the report was made after a meeting with Ms Finney, Ms Bower and Ms Jefferson in March 2012 with the review's author, Louise Dineley.

However, speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Finney explained that the three women did not decide to cover-up the review, but agreed it "required much further work" before being published.

She said: "At that meeting we reviewed the report and the report concluded that the activity that CQC had undertaken at Morecambe Bay was satisfactory.

"It was quite clear on reading the report that it was not satisfactory and CQC should have done more. So at that meeting we agreed that the report required much further work.

"There was not a decision at that meeting to delete that report, nor was there an instruction."

Ms Jefferson, who is still an employee of the CQC, added she "would never have conspired to cover up anything which could have led to a better understanding of what went wrong in the regulation of this hospital".

(JP/CD)