Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he has taken to ensure compliance with the (a) Government's fit and proper person test and (b) NHS duty of candour had been applied in relation to the evidence gathered during the review into Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust conducted by Dr Bill Kirkup.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is able to check that providers are meeting the Fit and Proper Persons Requirement (FPPR), either after a notification has been received when a new board director, board member or individual who performs the functions equivalent to the functions of a board director and member director is being appointed or during an inspection of a provider, and could impose a condition on the provider to require the removal of an unfit director.

The CQC has provided the following response:

Assessing compliance with FPPR is an integral part of the CQC’s assessment of inspections of well-led and this is business as usual. In addition to routine assessment of providers the CQC respond to any FPPR referrals through the processes in place since the regulation came into force. The CQC will continue to operate within the current regulations and will engage fully with the review and respond to any changes in the regulation moving forward.

The Kirkup Review, states that “a ‘just’ culture is one where openness and transparency is an essential ingredient to identify the root cause if care falls below standards, or when care doesn’t go according to plan”. The CQC’s assessments of Duty of Candour (DoC) are an integral part of assessments of well-led and the CQC continues to consider DoC as a matter of course.

The CQC looks at DoC as part of well–led assessments and have raised the profile of DoC in their State of Hospitals and ‘Learning, candour and accountability - A review of the way NHS trusts review and investigate the deaths of patients in England’ reports. In addition, the CQC plans this year to update guidance and refresh training for inspectors in this area.