Examination of Witnesses (Questions 371
- 379)
WEDNESDAY 21 JULY 2004
PROFESSOR BRIAN
TOFT
Q371 Chairman: Good morning, Professor
Toft. Thank you for coming to talk about your report. We will
fire some questions at you, so be as blunt and frank as you like
because you are going to be very important in terms of the input
you give us. There is a session afterwards and you are very welcome
to stay and listen to that as well. Let me start by asking you
how you would describe the response of the HFEA to your review
and your report.
Professor Toft: Could I first
of all say that the events in my report refer to the events and
the circumstances surrounding the regulatory regime and the events
at Leeds in July 2002 or prior to 2002, so this—
Q372 Chairman: Yes, we understand.
Professor Toft: Okay. I felt the
way in which the HFEA responded to my request for information
was inappropriate.
Q373 Chairman: Inappropriate?
Professor Toft: Inappropriate,
absolutely.
Q374 Chairman: You would not like
to go further than that?
Professor Toft: Yes, if you wish.
Q375 Chairman: Yes, please.
Professor Toft: When I first wrote
to them and asked them for some preliminary information—I
am not a medical person, I am a specialist in systems' failure—they
said they could not answer within three weeks. I felt some of
these questions were really quite perfunctory and should have
been answered much faster than that. Secondly, Dame Ruth Deech,
who was the chairman of the HFEA, was minded not to attend my
inquiry, as, indeed, was Suzanne McCarthy, chief executive for
four years. Effectively, both of these people refused to attend.
Not only that, when I told them the date on which I was going
to have my inquiry, they wanted to have an audit of the documents
relating to patients at Leeds on the same day. The Secretary of
State for Health and also the Chief Medical Officer are very keen
to get people to be proactive and to come forward with information
regarding adverse incidents; I did not think that having an audit
on the very day I was having my inquiry was perhaps the way in
which to engage. There are several other things which I could
go on about but I think that is sufficient.
Q376 Chairman: What happened then?
You did the report. Did they come back at you again with any call
for other information?
Professor Toft: Indeed, I did
come back asking for other information. I asked for some information
in September 2002; I eventually got the information in March 2003.
That was thanks to the new chief executive, Angela McNab, who
had been appointed by that time. She got some of her people to
do the research and I got the information I required on adverse
incidents, but it had taken quite a while to get that and it did
require me to go back to them and to ask them a second time. Of
course, the second time I did actually get the information.
Q377 Chairman: Since the publication
of your report, has there been any meeting with them, a conversation?
Professor Toft: Absolutely. I
went and saw them a few months ago and asked them how they had
engaged with my recommendations and I am given to understand,
from their response and their website and from a personal conversation
with the chief executive, that they have implemented at least
85% of my recommendations and all the rest are ongoing.
Q378 Dr Turner: Could you remind
us, who commissioned you?
Professor Toft: The Chief Medical
Officer.
Q379 Chairman: How would you describe
the way the HFEA is viewed amongst health professionals? You must
talk amongst people of your standing elsewhere in the country,
and you have obviously had an experience, how do other professionals
relate to that experience? Do they agree with your opinion?
Professor Toft: As far as I am
aware they do. Certainly prior to the new chief executive taking
over it was quite difficult to get anything out of them, but I
think that was more to do with this culture of secrecy that had
created itself over the years. I think people were very frightened
or certainly very apprehensive about saying anything about anything
to somebody outside of the organisation.
Chairman: We will come back to your experience
later on.
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