The Eljamel Public Inquiry: Dundee public event October 2024

The Eljamel Public Inquiry: Dundee Public Engagement Event October 2024

October 2024

The Eljamel Inquiry – Introduction by the Hon. Lord Weir - Chair

Welcome

1. May I begin by welcoming you all and thanking everyone for taking the time to attend this meeting. The purpose of today's meeting is to discuss the Inquiry's draft terms of reference and, importantly, we are here to listen to what you have to say about that. You may well have questions or concerns. You may wish to understand more about this Inquiry, it's team and the draft terms of reference. Shortly I will introduce myself and my team to you and explain some of the work that has been happening up until now, and Mr Dawson will discuss the draft terms of reference with you.

2. But before that, I would like to take this early opportunity to speak directly to the former patients of Mr Eljamel, many of whom will be here today. I am very conscious of the length of time you have waited for answers to your questions. I understand that you may feel frustrated and worn down by the time it has taken for you to get to this point. I do not underestimate the strain this has placed upon you and your loved ones. That is why my team and I wanted to come to you today to explain the work we are doing and to hear from you on the terms of reference. Until we finalise the terms of reference we cannot start our investigation and I am determined that we start that process as soon as possible. I hope after today you will see that my team and I are committed to working at pace to get the Inquiry set up in order that we can commence our investigations with rigour. Finalising the terms of reference is an essential part of that process and that is why we want to hear from you and all those with an interest in the work of this important Inquiry.

Introductions

The Inquiry Team

3. Let me begin by introducing myself to you. My name is Robert Weir. On 29 February this year it was my privilege to accept appointment by the Cabinet Secretary for NHS Recovery, Health and Social Care to the office of Chair to this Inquiry. I am a graduate of the University of Dundee and practised as an advocate at the Scottish Bar for 20 years. In that time, amongst other things, I practised in the field of clinical negligence. I was appointed a sheriff in 2015. Between 2018 and 2020 I sat on a specialist court called the All-Scotland Sheriff Personal Injury Court before my appointment to the bench of the Supreme Courts in Scotland in April of 2020.

4. I should like to reassure you at the very outset that I regard the issues likely to be raised in this Inquiry as of very significant importance and legitimate public interest. As Chair to the Inquiry you have my personal commitment to do all that I can to ensure that it is conducted with a thoroughness that those issues deserve. To assist me in meeting that commitment I have built a team that I am confident will approach the work of this Inquiry with professionalism, compassion and dedication. I would now like to introduce you to them.

5. First, may I introduce Jamie Dawson KC who has accepted appointment as senior counsel to the Inquiry. As some of you may be aware, Mr Dawson has recent and current experience of other public inquiries, most recently representing hundreds of patients in the UK-wide Infected Blood Inquiry, as well as having been Counsel to the UK Covid Inquiry whose Scottish hearings were held in Edinburgh. He has over 20 years of experience dealing, in large part, with complex medical negligence cases and will be well used to dealing with complex medical evidence while also possessing the advocacy skills that form an integral part of the leading role he has now assumed.

6. Alex Price-Marmion, Advocate, takes on the role of junior counsel to the Inquiry. She brings to that role long experience of advocacy, particularly in the field of clinical negligence in which she has represented claimants in numerous complex cases over the years. More recently, she has taken on the role of Advocate Depute, prosecuting serious criminal cases in the High Court. In that role she demonstrated the kind of forensic skills that will be of considerable importance to the work of the Inquiry, and I was delighted that she accepted my invitation to join the Inquiry Team.

7. The solicitor team will be led by Ciara Pang, who fulfils the role of Solicitor to the Inquiry. Ciara has most recently worked as deputy solicitor to the Sheku Bayoh Inquiry. This role has many similarities with the important post which she has taken in this Inquiry. Her in-depth experience of undertaking the work of an Inquiry has already proved invaluable to me and I have no doubt that she will contribute greatly to the effective functioning of this Inquiry and the many legal issues to which it will inevitably give rise.

8. Finally, I will have the able assistance of Lauren Murdoch who has assumed the important responsibilities of Secretary to the Inquiry. Lauren's background in public administration amply qualify her to take on the practical administration and management of the Inquiry and I anticipate that she will recruit assistance in early course to run the Inquiry Secretariat.

9. The establishment of an Inquiry Team is critical to progressing the work of the Inquiry and I am delighted at having been able to put together one with such a wealth of relevant experience as well as commitment and dedication to the responsibilities that lie ahead.

This Event

Purpose

10. I would now like to say a few words about the purpose of the event today. The main focus of the meeting is to discuss the terms of reference. Mr Dawson will soon speak to you about them and what they mean. He will look at them in some detail and we make no apology for that because it is important that you leave the meeting with a clear understanding of the likely scope of the Inquiry. After we have both spoken to you there will then be an opportunity to ask questions about the terms of reference. This is your opportunity to influence what the Inquiry will ultimately consider, whatever your interest in its work. If you do have a question about the terms of reference, there will be an opportunity to ask them after you have heard from Mr Dawson and me. Once we have finished there will be a short, 10 minute comfort break. We will then return for questions. Should you have a question to ask I would ask you to raise your hand and a microphone will be brought to you.

11. That said, the main way to contribute to the consultation exercise is by way of the online form. There is absolutely no pressure or expectation on anyone to contribute from the floor today. Indeed, you may want to take time to reflect on what Mr Dawson tells you before you express any views in writing on the terms of reference. This event is primarily about providing you with information about what we are doing, and why we are doing it. Please do not feel that you need say anything at all. But if you do have questions to help you understand the terms of reference you are of course welcome to ask them.

Update

Where we are

12. It is in the nature of Public Inquiries that establishing the infrastructure to make them operate effectively can take time. Viewed from the outside it may not seem like much is happening when the reality is very different. My team has been hard at work behind the scenes trying to put in place the staff and systems required to allow the work of the Inquiry to begin. That work can only begin when the terms of reference have been finalised. At the time of my appointment a set of draft terms of reference was provided to me on behalf of the Cabinet Secretary. With the necessary Inquiry Team appointments now complete, my legal team has been actively involved in researching publicly available material about Mr Eljamel's practice and re-casting the terms of reference in anticipation of issues which might be raised during the consultation exercise which brings us together today, and Mr Dawson will say a little more about that shortly.

13. You will know that I have asked for written responses to the draft terms of reference to be submitted by 25 October. What will then happen is that my legal team and I will examine the responses and advise the Cabinet Secretary about the outcome of this consultation exercise. That exercise will include advising on your comments and any themes which emerge. How long that takes will depend on the number of responses and what they say. We have tried to anticipate areas of likely interest that may not have been covered in the original draft terms of reference. We have worked hard both to clarify and to expand upon the original draft, and the product of that is the draft we have shared with you.

14. I appreciate that this phase of the Inquiry's work takes time and that until the Inquiry is set up it is difficult for my team to communicate updates to you on the work that is being done. However, these public meetings and consulting on the draft terms of reference represent a genuinely important staging post in the progress of the Inquiry. Shortly, I will ask Mr Dawson to speak to you about the draft terms of reference, and what happens next, but before I do that it might help if I say something about my general approach to, and expectations of, the Inquiry I have been asked to chair.

General Approach/Expectations

Patient Focus

15. Let me immediately recognise that, while there are many people and organisations who will be interested in the work of the Inquiry, I am acutely conscious of the situation of the former patients of Mr Eljamel who have campaigned, and certainly waited, for a very long time for this process to unfold and many of whom will be in attendance. Let me be clear. You will be at the centre of this process. Though my team and I act in the public interest in the discharge of our responsibilities a key component in that public interest involves paying close attention to, giving respect to, and acting compassionately towards, those former patients of Mr Eljamel who have been harmed or otherwise affected by the care they received. To that end my Inquiry team will strive to be understanding of, and respond to, the impact of trauma on all those affected in this way. You can all expect the Inquiry's careful and courteous consideration in its interactions with you. Finding answers to your unresolved questions is a task to which my team and I are committed and dedicated. I hope that will become apparent as the Inquiry progresses.

Independence

16. Let me also stress to you all, as Chair of this Inquiry, that my team and I are independent of Government. We are independent of NHS Tayside and also independent of any of the other organisations mentioned in the draft terms of reference. Once they are finalised, I will look to fulfil the Inquiry's terms of reference with no hidden agenda whatsoever just as, in my professional life hitherto, I would undertake the duties of a professional judge without any personal interest in the cases over which I presided. The independence of my Inquiry is protected by law - and I take very seriously the independent responsibility I have been asked to assume by taking on the role of Chair.

Commitment to investigate

17. The law requires me to conduct the Inquiry fairly and economically. That I will do in what I hope will be a mutual spirit of cooperation and, where possible, consensus with legal representatives of core participants and others. But you may also take it that I will not hesitate to use the powers contained in the Act that enable me to call for and recover evidence, and compel the attendance of witnesses, in order to exhaust the Inquiry's terms of reference. If that means challenging systems that were in place at the relevant time, or, ultimately, criticising individuals or organisations (or both), I will not shrink from doing so. While a public inquiry is prevented by law from determining a person's criminal or civil liability that prohibition does not prevent it from drawing conclusions and making judgments about what went wrong and why, or identifying those responsible, and if appropriate you may all take it that that is what the Inquiry will do.

Length of the Inquiry

18. Can I now say something very briefly about timing. It is in the nature of a public inquiry that it is not possible to predict with any certainty how long the whole process will take. That is because we have to go where the evidence takes us. That said, I do wish to make it clear to everyone that my commitment to you is to conduct as thorough an investigation as I can in as short a time as is reasonable to enable me to fulfil the terms of reference. I have absolutely no personal interest in the Inquiry taking any longer than is necessary to answer the many questions people have about its subject matter. Delay is in the interests of no one and I will do all that I can to see that avoidable delays are just that, avoided. But I would also ask you to bear in mind that proceeding with excessive haste runs the risk that the Inquiry omits something important. I am fully alive to the likely complexity of many of the issues the Inquiry will be considering. That is why, amongst many other responsibilities, I have to balance the need to make progress with the need to investigate as fully as I can the finalised terms of reference.

Inquiry premises

19. To accommodate the size of the Inquiry, technical aspects and the numbers involved from day to day, but also to enable the hearings to be conducted in a properly trauma-informedway, the Inquiry's hearings will be conducted from premises in Edinburgh, and the Inquiry Team is in the process of securing premises as we speak. I understand that not everyone can attend a hearing in Edinburgh and that is why we will be exploring ways in which the hearings can be broadcast. I want to ensure the Inquiry is as accessible as possible and that anyone with an interest in the Inquiry's work can watch and listen to the evidence wherever they happen to be.

The Independent Clinical Reviews

Professor Wigmore

20. The Cabinet Secretary has previously announced his intention to establish independent clinical reviews, a process chaired by Professor Wigmore. We understand that to be for two main reasons: (i) to provide an independent review of the cases of patients who wish one, and (ii) to provide the medical and clinical context for the Inquiry's systemic analysis of NHS Tayside at the material time. Or, to put it more simply, the Clinical Reviews are intended to set out what happened and what went wrong clinically; the Public Inquiry will investigate what systems should have existed to detect and/or prevent harm from occurring, and whether the systems that did exist were in any way defective. It is in that sense that the Inquiry has been described as carrying out a "systemic" investigation.

21. I am aware that questions have been raised about whether Professor Wigmore and I have been, or are, working together. Both the Inquiry and the ICR are independent processes. The Inquiry will, however, seek to rely on the findings of the ICR. Evidence of what happened in individual cases and what went wrong is vital material for the Public Inquiry to consider. The Inquiry needs to ensure that the ICR can provide it with what it needs in order to carry out its investigations. Mr Dawson will say a little bit more in his address to you about how these two processes expect to relate to each other, and what the Inquiry can be doing in the meantime (which is plenty).

The Name

The Eljamel Inquiry

22. Finally, one thing that you may have noticed relates to the name of the Inquiry. The materials which we made public in this consultation exercise named the Inquiry as the "Eljamel and NHS Tayside Inquiry". As you will see, today we present ourselves to you as simply "the Eljamel Inquiry". Mr Dawson will explain the contents of the terms of reference in a moment. He will make it clear that these are not yet finalised. He will also explain that the Inquiry currently intends to investigate the role of bodies beyond NHS Tayside in the professional practice of Mr Eljamel. But not only that, we have noted that the Inquiry has tended to be referred to by former patients and in the media as the Eljamel Inquiry. Therefore, we present ourselves to you today under that shorter title. Fundamentally, the Inquiry is about the professional practice of Mr Eljamel. He is the common factor that applies to every aspect of the proposed terms of reference. Thus, our present intention is simply to call the Inquiry "the Eljamel Inquiry".

23. But let me stress that you will have your opportunity to express your views about this as well. If this proposal concerns you, then you can say that in your response and we will listen.

Concluding remarks

24. I hope these introductory remarks have helped you to understand where we have reached in what, on any view, will be a long process. At the root of all of this lies the National Health Service. As other Inquiries in Scotland, and elsewhere, have shown, looking back on matters which are of fundamental importance to the operation of the National Health Service will always be of value to its current and future operation, whether in Tayside or more widely. If criticism is to be levelled, let it be so. If there are lessons to be learned, let them be learned. This Inquiry will be a journey but, wherever the evidence takes us, I hope that it will be a valuable journey that meets the justifiable expectations of former patients, members of the medical profession, then and now, and the wider public who rely today, as much as they ever did, on the provision of safe, reliable and accessible healthcare. I will personally strive to make it so.