Health secretary Wes Streeting accused of ignoring whistleblower who revealed nursing scandal

Exclusive: Health secretary warned he must act on regulator Nursing and Midwifery Council

Health secretary Wes Streeting has been accused of ignoring a whistleblower who helped to uncover a major scandal within the nursing regulator.

Evidence of widespread racism and a “toxic culture” within the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) that was putting the public and nurses at risk was found in July by an independent review by Rise Associates, headed by former prosecutor Nazir Afzal . The review was commissioned by the NMC following an exposé in The Independent revealing a whistleblower’s allegations and that it was allowing rogue nurses to work unchecked.

The worker who exposed the scandal wrote to Mr Streeting and the Department of Health and Social Care multiple times to raise their concerns. Five letters, seen by The Independent, were sent to the health secretary’s office between September last year when he was shadow health secretary and after he became health secretary in July. However, they have not received a response.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting (PA Wire)

In a subsequent email to Mr Streeting’s office on 31 July, the whistleblower called for the NMC chair Sir David Warren to be removed and other board members including interim chief Helen Herniman.

The email: “You ignored me when I reached out to you for help on 26 September 2023 [the day The Independent published its first story into the scandal].

“What more are you waiting for? And who is watching the watchers here when you don’t step up and do what you are supposed to as oversight bodies?”

Mr Streeting’s office said he could not respond to the whistleblower in September as he was not their MP. However, last September Ben Bradshaw – who was still an MP at the time but not for the whistleblower’s constituency – supported the complainant and called for action from the government.

Last week The Independent revealed the NMC’s former chief executives allegedly said the whistleblower could “take a running jump” after they raised a concern. The accusations come after Mr Streeting promised greater protections for whistleblowers, previously telling The Sunday Times: “We cannot have a culture where whistleblowers are not only afraid to come forward, but where they do, they are actively silenced.”

Following the Rise review, health minister Karin Smyth and Mr Streeting have called in Sir David to meet to set out the organisation’s response to the damning findings.

A spokesperson for Mr Streeting said: “We cannot have a culture where whistleblowers are afraid to come forward, feel ignored or, in the worst cases, are actively silenced. Strict parliamentary protocol dictates that MPs only act on behalf of their constituents, and Wes was not secretary of state at the time, but is actively looking at what more can be done to strengthen and protect the role of whistleblowers.”