Eluned Morgan told to investigate herself by hospital campaigners

Martin Shipton

Campaigners who oppose the chosen location for a new cancer hospital in south Wales have asked First Minister Eluned Morgan to commission an inquiry into her own handling of the issue.

The decision to build the new Velindre Cancer Centre on a standalone site in north Cardiff has been hugely controversial, with many doctors saying it should have been co-located with an existing general hospital.

Now retired GP Dr Penny Owen and non-medical Dr Roy Kearsley, of the group Colocate Velindre, have lodged a formal complaint about Baroness Morgan, who until her elevation as First Minister was Health Minister and then Cabinet Secretary for Health.

The group argues that a crucial document submitted to the NHS Infrastructure Investment Board (IIB) in 2020 should not have included the sentence: “Nuffield [the independent Nuffield Health think tank] had confirmed that the Velindre model of a stand-alone non-acute cancer hospital rather than co-location on an acute hospital site was an appropriate clinical model.”

Instead, says Colocate Velindre, the Nuffield Advice actually confirmed colocation as the usual and preferable UK-wide NHS model, but noted that a lengthy timetable for any new Heath Hospital in Cardiff impeded ‘full colocation’ in south east Wales.

“We can safely say the words of the claim appear nowhere in the Nuffield advice,” says the group.

Breach 

In their letter to the First Minister, Drs Owen and Kearsley state: “We understand that any claim of breach of the Ministerial Code of Conduct goes to the First Minister; hence this letter comes before you now. It is uniquely marked by gravity and absurdity at the same time. This is because it raises the question of you yourself breaching the code when Health Minister, but incongruously finds you made arbiter over yourself by appointment to your new role.

“At first, our correspondence with you from September to December 2023 merely pressed you as Health Minister to correct false information issuing from you and other ministers. We just sought a full, official, public retraction of a false narrative regarding the new Velindre Centre’s legitimacy. Unfortunately you went no further than a partial, and even contradictory, response, and added what we perceived as further breaches. We still await a reply to our closing evidence or an unqualified, public retraction. Until then, we see the infringements as live and active even now.

“However, with political uncertainty ended over the First Minister’s office and Cabinet, we feel justified in taking this extra step of an official complaint now. The questions of fact are not trivial, since they concern at least £1bn of precious cancer money splashed on a cancer centre model belonging in the past century. It is a record Welsh NHS capital debt for an asset that is shrinking.

“In brief, evidence from the correspondence shows: 1) that you erroneously assured a correspondent that the decision for the new Velindre’s contentious clinical model (ie a centre away from a major hospital), was reviewed by the Nuffield Trust; 2) that your substituted version was nevertheless just as misleading. It still opted to say erroneously that the cancer centre model was ‘subject to the Nuffield Trust’;and 3) you yet more erroneously, that you’d never raised the cancer centre model with us at all. We unpack these claims below.

* In 2020, clinicians regionwide, and the eminent Welsh External Advisory Board to cancer research, criticised Welsh Government’s plan to locate a new cancer centre away from a major hospital (a ‘standalone’). Calls clamoured for the skipped in-depth, clinical review to scrutinise this 1960s-style cancer centre choice, including the large-scale survey essential to high quality care.

* In response, Health Minister Vaughan Gething, announced the Nuffield Trust ‘advice’, but falsely announced it on more than one occasion as the needed review. However, the Velindre Trust itself made clear that its ‘advice’ was no such thing. It neither intended, nor carried out, a revisit of the cancer centre model decision. Rather, its focus was the allied cancer network management risks.

* Mr. Gething was forced to withdraw his claim of a Nuffield review. His 2021 plea that it was a ‘misspeak’ is contradicted by his repeated infringements, misleading even Senedd members and health officials.”

Complaint

The letter goes on to state:

* The complaint arises from the correspondence mentioned above, especially the response to an email addressed to Eluned Morgan as Health Secretary. Asked directly, officials gave reassurance that their replies reflected ‘the Welsh Government’s position [on the new Velindre cancer centre clinical model]. That, of course, is the position you led on.

* Hence, your stance derived from the highest political level, not from officials.

* The medical campaign group Colocate Velindre had sought only an official, public retraction of apparently dishonest statements. The group saw these as misleading the public over the new Velindre’s safety, future-proofing and fitness for purpose. But as the correspondence unfolded, it yielded two further narratives from you, just as misleading as earlier ones.

* In September 2023, an email to you was met with a reply reinstating Mr. Gething’s already retracted and discredited assertion in 2021. As a written piece it was intentional not a misspeak.

“ Challenged on this, you fell back on a re-casting. Now, apparently, the Health Minister only meant to say the cancer centre model had been ‘subject to Nuffield.’ But Nuffield’s terms of reference and report did not evidence any intent to re-open the cancer centre options appraisal.

* However, as we pointed out, the Nuffield authors did indicate new Velindre’s true place in their work. This lay in the risks it posed to managing the cancer network, ie not the standalone decision but its consequences. In fact, the decision formed the indisputable assumption of their work. Hence the authors were subject to the cancer centre model, not the other way round.

* Now, by abruptly re-setting the terms of the conversation, you implicitly caved in to our rejection of the new term ‘subject to Nuffield’. You took refuge in claiming that your emails had always meant the cancer network model was ‘subject to Nuffield’. Too late, we suggest. This rabbit-out-of-the-hat is totally implausible. It flatly contradicts our entire previous conversation. What’s more, the network model had never been controversial or challenged by anyone.

* Thus, you suddenly dropped your own, unambiguous claim at the start, that Nuffield had addressed the cancer centre model’s appropriateness – the original topic, chosen by you. The correspondence’s last email, therefore, finally exposes not just a single misrepresentation, but a serial one. This state of things remains live now, still awaiting your explanation to the contrary.

Call

The letter adds: “We trust you to recognise that you cannot make the call on this unique complaint. We understand why, instead, you might just be tempted to turn to Mr Drakeford to do this [until the reshuffle this week, Mark Drakeford was Cabinet Secretary for Health]. But unfortunately, he has already disqualified himself. He too disseminated the same false information in almost identical words, a point not challenged by you. To Mr. Gething then? But he was shown in the correspondence to have excelled you both in misleading the public. Your department has already retracted the core of his position. Given your status as First Minister, we humbly suggest no Labour MS or other official has the necessary detachment to publicly adjudicate on this complaint.

“Three First Ministers are involved, and we therefore formally urge you to recuse yourself and direct our complaint to a body that is truly independent and impartial in the eyes of the public. Could this move not be an early, presumably welcome, opportunity to show the people of Wales you really are turning a new page as promised at your appointment as First Minister?

“You yourself are well aware that the code dictates that where breach of conduct by misinformation is exposed, the minister resigns. This does not apply to Mr. Gething as he is no longer a minister. But it does apply to the current First Minister.. Given such gravity, surely it is urgent to get the complaint processed without stalling or partiality.”

We asked the Welsh Government to respond, but did not receive a statement.

Previously the Welsh Government has insisted that the Nuffield advice in effect ruled out colocation in the short term.