David Nicholson Refuses to Meet The Whistleblowers

The Coalition Government has made great waves crowing about their support for whistleblowers. A group of us decided we would test this out. Any reasonable government would wish to speak to whistleblowers. Anyhow, I suggested that because David Nicholson did not understand the basic issues surrounding whistleblowing, he should meet up with 10 of us [ including Steve Bolsin]. This is in line with the government's interest in public opinion. Here is El Gov asking us all to participate. http://yourfreedom.hmg.gov.uk/ . When it comes to the crunch, does the Department of Health actually want any whistleblowers to participate in policy making and the review of PIDA. The answer below is a resounding "no".

Nicholson who is the NHS Chief Executive likes his accolades. He likes to sign his letters off with his CBE and KCB. That would be fine if he could actually understand the basics of whistleblowing. Anyhow, this is what he stated in a email to me 

"As Sir David's previous reply explained,  the Department is committed to strengthening the whistleblowing procedure and is working with NHS staff to provide an independent authority to whom they can turn if their concerns are not fully addressed.  I note your request for a meeting, but this work will be led by policy officials rather than the Chief Executive's office and so we do not believe that a meeting would be beneficial at this time". [ 25th August 2010] 

This is translated has " F off you lowlife whistleblowers, we want to cosmetically imply support without actually supporting any whistleblower on the planet UK". We get the message David. There won't be any further pro Coalition Government material on this blog :). Anyone who wishes to correspond with Dave, can write to him here David.Nicholson@dh.gsi.gov.uk