NHS manager who earned £1m jailed for fabricating qualifications

A former probation officer who earned more than £1m working in very senior NHS management roles after he fabricated qualifications has been jailed for two years.

Jon Andrewes, 63, claimed to have two PhDs and a master’s degree but in fact had only a higher education diploma in social work and a teaching qualification. He also lied over his work history, falsely claiming to have worked in the Home Office.

Andrewes, who styled himself Dr though he had no right to the title, worked for more than a decade in various senior health jobs across the south-west of England including chair of the Royal Cornwall hospital trust. He was also chief executive at St Margaret’s hospice in Taunton and temporary chair of Torbay NHS trust.

Sentencing him at Exeter crown court, Judge Geoffrey Mercer QC told Andrewes: “For a period of over 10 years your outwardly prestigious life was based upon a lie, a series of staggering lies, repeated lies about your education, and employment background and your experience. Lies by which you obtained responsible positions.”

He said Andrewes would not have held those roles if he had told the truth and he had caused real damage to public confidence in the organisations he worked in.

Andrewes falsely claimed to have:

• A diploma from the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants

• A PhD in ethics management from Plymouth University

• A PhD in business administration from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh

• A master’s from the University of Edinburgh

• A degree from the University of Bristol

After the hearing, Alex Johnson, a senior crown prosecutor with the CPS’s specialist fraud division, said: “Jon Andrewes repeatedly lied on his CV in order to better his chances of securing lucrative senior roles across the health service. The investigation team built a case which clearly outlined the scale of the deception and, faced with the evidence against him, Andrewes pleaded guilty.”

Andrewes, of Totnes in Devon, admitted two counts of fraud and one count of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception. The prosecution followed an investigation by anti-fraud officials at the Department of Health.

Cameron Brown, prosecuting, said Andrewes earned more than £1m during a 10-year period. He said the prosecution did not accept Andrewes’s claim that he had performed excellently during his time at various NHS bodies, saying he was rated as “unsatisfactory” in some of his jobs.

Ros Collins, defending, said Andrewes was extremely regretful and remorseful at his “sheer stupidity” in fabricating his educational qualifications. She said: “He has every respect for his former employers. He is very distressed for causing them any embarrassment. He has been loyal to the caring profession for many, many years.”

Collins said the sham qualifications gave him a “foot in the door” but making a success of it was down to him. She added: “These things happen where people inflate their CV out of desperation to get work.”

The court was told there was an ongoing NHS investigation into how Andrewes was able to hoodwink his way into senior roles.

NHS manager who earned £1m jailed for fabricating qualifications

Chelsea Manager Jose Mourinho Displays Why Teams Should not Employ Medical professionals

[unable to retrieve total-text content material]

If Chelsea club physician Eva Carneiro had not tended to the player when the match official called for healthcare attention, beyond something about simple human decency, she would have violated the simple ethics and responsibility of the healthcare occupation.

Chelsea Manager Jose Mourinho Displays Why Teams Should not Employ Medical professionals

"I blame the jelly" says manager of nursery where toddler choked to death

Following currently being offered breakfast, personnel at the nursery began “free flow”.

Just following 9.30am, Tiya was discovered lying unconscious. She died the following day at St George’s Hospital in Tooting, the inquest heard.

Prashant Popat representing Tiya’s mother and father, said: “No adult in that nursery noticed Tiya take jelly from the table.

“No grownup saw or heard Tiya put jelly in her mouth. No grownup saw or heard Tiya choke.

“If she coughed or struggled for breath or created noises, she was not noticed or heard.

“No grownup noticed or heard Tiya fall to the ground.

“If young children have to be supervised at all occasions do you truly think that there was ample supervision?”

Mr Hayes replied: “I wasn’t there, I do not know who was in the area.

“I blame the jelly.

“I truly feel the problem wasn’t about supervision, this was about an instantaneous point.

“Jelly was out and we didn’t know it could lead to immediate asphyxiation.”

Mr Hayes, operations manager at the nursery, “deliberately missed” the incident in his formal report to Ofsted and supplied inaccurate data about how many staff have been on duty, it was claimed.

The nursery boss then suspended an assistant even although she had accomplished “nothing” to deserve it, to attempt and appease the inspectors and hold the nursery open, the inquest heard.

In a report to the regional authority the day right after the tragedy he wrote that 3 personnel had been stationed during the rooms when only two had been present and no-one particular was supervising Tiya.

“On the allocation sheet at the time of the incident there have been two employees which is not what you have written,” coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox advised Mr Hayes.

“At the time Tiya was discovered there might have been no staff.

“There is nothing to indicate that when this youngster was identified there could not have been any members of staff.”

Mr Hayes replied that he “panicked” and “didn’t know what data to put”.

“It’s what I put down with very good intentions,” he explained.

“Looking at this it could seem that you are attempting to minimise the circumstances,” Dr Wilcox mentioned.

Ofsted ordered that the nursery should be closed for six weeks right after the incident.

But Mr Hayes wrote to the authority with a set of self-imposed regulations and it was allowed to reopen soon after just two weeks.

“We had to give emergency child care to all our parents,” he stated.

“If it had been closed for six weeks all of our mother and father would have been devastated.

“The households would have discovered somewhere else, they relied on us.”

The problems included that Dicky Birds would not use jelly in perform or on the menu and totally free flow sessions would be stopped.

The nursery also promised to suspend the workers right concerned in the incident but only assistant Natasha Collins was suspended.

Mr Hayes: “We had to pick someone so I picked Natasha.

“She had cold sores all about her mouth, she was truly distressed and truly unwell.

“She had yearly depart so I made a decision to meet the criteria and picked Natasha.”

He added: “I had to suspend someone so I picked Natasha, I could have suspended plenty of men and women.”

Miss Collins had been assigned to the art area, which adjourned the area in which the jelly table was, at the time of the incident.

She was drawing with a group of young children and had a constrained view of Tiya from exactly where she was, the inquest heard.

Mr Hayes admitted that she had completed “nothing” to deserve becoming suspended but claimed he “did it sweetly”.

“My priority was to reopen the nursery,” he mentioned.

“If I had applied any type of logic to it I would have had to suspend half of the nursery.”

Dr Wilcox accused Mr Hayes of producing a scapegoat out of Miss Collins and stated: “To the jury this may possibly appear as a bit of a management stitch-up.”

The inquest continues.

"I blame the jelly" says manager of nursery where toddler choked to death

Former Organic Historical past Museum manager wins £500k in damages

Leigh said she could not sit or stand and was screaming in agony for 50 minutes even though properly-that means passengers tried to support. Photograph: Richard Gittins/Champion News

An exhibitions manager at the Natural Historical past Museum who had to leave her occupation when she designed submit-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) right after she was trapped on a bus has won £522,379 damages.

Ceri Leigh, 50, claimed that her psychiatric damage was triggered by the delay in an ambulance arriving soon after she dislocated her right kneecap and was unable to move from in between the seats of the bus she had boarded at Wimbledon station, south-west London, on her way residence from operate in November 2008.

Leigh mentioned she could not sit or stand and was screaming in agony for 50 minutes even though well-which means passengers tried to aid and held her down to stop her moving, which added to her feeling of helplessness.

Each additional minute extra to the trauma of her experience until finally she felt “utter despair”, mentioned Mr Justice Globe at London’s higher court on Thursday.

Leigh mentioned she felt trapped, was shaking violently, grew to become unable to hold her mind collectively, remembered “no longer being aware of who she was” and went “into a freeze”.

She did not recover full function in the knee for about 18 months and grew to become housebound, struggling flashbacks, nightmares and a higher level of anxiety and depression. She also began to endure dissociative seizures.

In February 2011, she was medically retired from the work which she loved – managing the design, set up and conservation of specimens at the museum – and monetary pressures drove her and her husband to move to south Wales.

London Ambulance Support NHS Trust admitted there was a negligent delay of 17 minutes in the ambulance arriving but disputed the link with Leigh’s psychiatric difficulties and the volume of damages.

Their lawyers stated that, throughout 2010 and 2011, she had other stresses including issues with marital communications, fear about regardless of whether her husband would be produced redundant, economic difficulties, her son’s trans-gender concerns, her daughter’s concerns about her adoption and the pressures of litigation.

The judge, who witnessed a seizure when Leigh gave proof by video-hyperlink so as to conserve her travelling, explained that the delay manufactured a “materials contribution” to the development of her PTSD.

“There are innumerable variables in the situations that will give rise to the development of this kind of a disorder and in the men and women who are likely to endure it. It is unattainable to predict on any scientific or mathematical basis the minute following which somebody will go on to endure it.”

He said he was satisfied that the seizures have been all component of the PTSD and consequent on it and were not associated to other stresses in her life.

The judge stated he had no hesitation in accepting that Leigh’s damage was serious as all facets of her existence have been badly impacted and additional treatment was anticipated to make only a minimal improvement.

Former Organic Historical past Museum manager wins £500k in damages

A day in the daily life of … a services manager at the Brain Damage Rehabilitation Trust

Kerri Tunstall performs for a charity that offers rehabilitation, care and assistance for people with an acquired brain damage. Photograph: Birt

I get up at 6am most mornings, observe the news and have breakfast before the rest of the loved ones start off stirring. It’s great to begin the day with some quiet time. I typically get the train into operate and catch up on some emails on my BlackBerry, or read a guide on the commute.

I generally arrive at our professional residential centre at Redford Court, Liverpool among 8 and eight.15am. The centre offers rehabilitation, care and assistance for folks with an acquired brain damage, and forms element of the nationwide network of rehabilitation support services supplied by the Brain Damage Rehabilitation Believe in (Birt).

I get started by catching up with employees, checking the message book and completing other administrative duties. But the work day officially begins at 9am with a crew handover.

On some days I attend and joint chair the clinical meeting. It is developed to discuss the clinical needs and programs for people sufferers at the moment undergoing brain damage rehabilitation. We use Birt’s neurobehavioral model which assures that every person, from our in-house clinical teams, by way of to our rehabilitation help workers, know the person ambitions and aspirations of every person in our care and are capable to accessibility the assistance they need to fulfil them.

I’ll frequently invest time producing reviews and information for monitoring services users and measuring our functionality. My position also requires workers supervision, acquiring feedback from these in the service and following up any incidents or investigations.

One of my principal tasks is auditing and checking that the systems we have in place are doing work and are up to date. I also chase workers if we believe there may be a gap in meeting the standard needs set by our regulatory bodies – the Care Top quality Commission and the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities.

Some days I’ll consume lunch with the service users in the dining room, other times I do functioning lunches. But I am extremely guilty of frequently eating lunch at my desk!

I have been here for doing work for Birt for twelve and a half years, but I have usually had an awareness of disability. My cousin has cerebral palsy and, when I was expanding up, my very best friend’s brother had muscular dystrophy.

My interest in the caring and nursing occupation started out when I was invited, one particular summertime, to turn out to be a teenage volunteer for a local group who worked with children with finding out disabilities.

I then moved on to function complete-time in care for these with studying disabilities, and discovered Birt and their operate as the charity top brain injury rehabilitation in the Uk.

In the afternoon, I will spend time liaising with external parties, locating out what the new NHS commissioners and funders are searching for. There is always a focus on conferences and seminars. We organize our personal locally for professionals functioning in the discipline of brain injury. We organise speakers on a range of topics affecting us and we also attend other organisations’ occasions.

There are problems to my function. Each and every support user has unique requirements. The essential is finding a stability between how we meet all our demands whilst maintaining an individualised technique. We work with human beings, not numbers or files, and we treat absolutely everyone uniquely.

There are demanding troubles facing service end users, their loved ones, families and pals and also our personnel. It really is a juggling act to keep it operating smoothly and productively.

I will tidy my desk and then catch the train house, finishing electronic mail correspondence on the commute. It truly is essential to me to total every thing before I get house, to permit me household time. It doesn’t always operate like that but I try out!

Being a full-time, working mum means you can miss numerous issues, so this is genuinely essential for us as a household. My parents gather the little ones from school so I pay a visit to my dad and mom day-to-day. They are excellent at acquiring almost everything back into standpoint.

These days I nonetheless uncover time to volunteer. We as a household are component of the Never ever Observe Alone venture – in which we support a man with learning disabilities to attend the rugby matches. We have been performing it for four seasons now and it is not a position to us any longer, we have just acquired a pal.

Right after the kids are in bed I view Tv with my husband and switch off. Hardly ever do I worry about perform, but it really is always at the back of my thoughts just like any job. I’ll be thinking of various approaches to do things or just conversations I’ve had that day with service users that made me giggle or inspired me.

If you would like to feature in our Day in the Life series, or know an individual who would, electronic mail healthcare@theguardian.com

This report is published by Guardian Skilled. Join the Healthcare Professionals Network to receive normal emails and exclusive delivers.

A day in the daily life of … a services manager at the Brain Damage Rehabilitation Trust