CQC brings in whistleblowing gurus to boost ‘independence and credibility’

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has hired two independent whistleblowing champions, Joy Warmington and Arpita Dutt, to oversee a major review of how it listens to concerns.

The CQC previously announced it had appointed Zoe Leventhal KC, of Matrix Chambers, to lead the first phase of the review, which is considering how the CQC handled protected disclosures made by Shyam Kumar, an orthopaedic surgeon at University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay Foundation Trust, and whether ethnicity “played any part in the management of those disclosures”.

On Friday it issued details of the second phase of the work, including that it had brought in two outside experts, and long-time champions of whistleblowers, to “help to ensure the independence and credibility of the review”.

This was launched amid wider concerns about how it responds to whistleblowing concerns in the service and among its own staff, including potential discrimination and also comes as the CQC itself seeks to begin a major restructure.

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Source: HSJ, 22 November 2022