Sir, – While the Taoiseach’s statement that there was “a failure of open disclosure by doctors and also a failure by senior management to make sure that that happened” is welcome, the harsh reality is that he as minister for health had an opportunity to implement mandatory disclosure but declined to do so.
When the HSE and hospital finally admitted negligence in our daughter’s birth after 3½ years of evasion and denials in July 2015, we wrote to the then minister for health Leo Varadkar calling for a statutory duty of candour and received a response telling us that “open disclosure is similar to duty of candour” . We queried how a voluntary disclosure policy could possibly be similar to a legal obligation to disclose but sadly have yet to receive a response.
In the intervening period a number of other families have stood on the steps of the Four Courts and called for a statutory duty of candour but were ignored by our legislators. While the HSE deserves criticism, the reality is that it is our legislators who declined to make disclosure mandatory and as such bear primary responsibility for the current situation.
The current Minister for Health now needs to do what the Taoiseach should have done in 2015 and immediately implement a statutory duty of candour. If the Government is unwilling to do this, it cannot credibly criticise the HSE for failing to disclose failings. – Yours, etc,
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RUARY and
NANCI MARTIN,
Sandyford, Dublin 18.