To The Health Select Committee

For the urgent attention of;
Members of the Health Select Committee

12th September 2017

Dear Mr Yardley,
Could you ensure this letter and attached evidence is brought to the attention of all committee members as a matter of urgency.
I have written ten letters to the Secretary of State for Health since March, I have received no response or acknowledgment to any of these letters.

To summarise the key points of this correspondence;
Internal emails between Department of Health officials and CQC board members David Behan, Andrea Sutcliffe and whilst chairing the Whistle-blowing Inquiry, Robert Francis QC.
These emails were obtained via a Subject Access Request.
Prior to becoming a CQC board member and whilst conducting a publically funded inquiry into whistle-blowing, Robert Francis QC emailed David Behan and disclosed the fact that I had submitted evidence to his inquiry. David Behan informed Andrea Sutcliffe who in turn informed my former employer. A staggering breech of confidentiality from both a public Inquiry Judge and the proscribed regulator under the current whistle-blowing legislation PIDA. I have written to Robert Francis QC who also failed to respond.

My comprehensive report “CQC An Going Concern” Published December 2015 and sent to the Minister for Social Care. The findings in my report also featured in several Private Eye issues. My Report exposed that hundreds of care homes across the country were being re-registered by the CQC as new provider’s when this was untrue and that these homes inspection histories were being archived or deleted from the CQC website. A large number of emails between the Department of Health and CQC confirm who knew what and when and what action was taken. I have never received a single acknowledgement of my report.

Since that time no action what so ever has been taken to address the concerns I raised, a significant number of the homes featured in my report “CQC An On-going Concern” have subsequently harmed or abused vulnerable adults. My further reports on this were also sent to the Secretary of State for Health asking why CQC had been allowed to mislead the public by withholding vital information about a home’s past history and were publishing statements that were blatantly and fundamentally untrue.
Just to highlight one such example Sussex Healthcare, a company whose homes had a long history of appalling care and abusive practices, but that history was concealed from the public by the CQC who are the very organisation charged with providing the public with accurate and reliable information. The internal emails are a damming indictment as they confirm prior knowledge and failure to act in spite of being fully aware. To date this misconduct continues to occur.

The CQC internal emails also show the CQC stance on our evidence highlighting care home evictions. This was also sent to the Secretary of State for Health without a response.

There are also CQC internal emails which prove that CQC have actively briefed against this Charity to the media and have done so for no other reason than this charity being effective in exposing abuse that CQC had previously been aware of but had failed to act on. These actions amount to defamation and the failure to act aides and abets that defamation. This evidence was also sent to the Secretary of State for Health.

There is also correspondence as well as Subject Access data which shows CQC to have dishonestly and intentionally defamed this charity by repeatedly and consistently taking the stance that we have not provided the CQC with information to enable them to act on concerns in spite of the fact that I have full documentation to prove that I did inform them. I have repeatedly confronted them with this to no avail.

There is also the correspondence with Andrea Sutcliffe attached which further highlights issues. Such as CQC revealing the identity of 47 whistle-blowers to their employers and then offering to investigate 47 employers who revealed whistle-blowers identity’s to CQC!
This correspondence along with all of the above evidence was also sent to The Secretary of State for Health.

As a national Charity with a long history of evidencing abuse in care settings I find it completely unacceptable that I could raise issues that relate to CQCs serious misconduct resulting in harm to vulnerable people and that Jeremy Hunt could completely ignore this evidence. To not respond to ten letters in over six months amounts to a stance of silence as the indefensible can no longer be defended.
As I have provided the CQC and Health Departments own emails as evidence this obviously makes it impossible to deny these facts but when vulnerable people’s lives are at stake should self-preservation be the primary concern?

I look forward to urgent action being taken on all these issues,

Yours Sincerely

.

Eileen Chubb