'Stop gagging our NHS governors' - Farron

MP Tim Farron has called on Health Secretary Andrew Lansley to remove the gag that prevents local NHS public governors from speaking out about conditions in our local health service.

Public governors are the voice of local residents on the hospital trust board, but they are not allowed to talk to the media or the public about issues relating to their role.

With Morecambe Bay hospital bosses under fire due to high mortality rates, queuing ambulances atLancasterand failures in the appointments system, Tim believes it has never been more important that the public hear the truth about what is going on in our local hospitals.

Tim said: "Our public governors are the good guys. They hold the bosses to account and stand up for protecting services at our local hospital in Kendal. It is very wrong that our governors are not able speak out for us and give us an inside account of how our hospital trust is run."

Tim is also concerned that public governors have been forced to leave trust meetings half way through for 'reasons of confidentiality' and has asked Andrew Lansley to address this to.

Tim described this as a "Failure to allow patients to be properly represented. Our Public governors are excellent and dedicated people but they are being prevented from holding NHS bosses to account - that's why we are so often reliant on NHS staff taking huge personal risks by blowing the whistle on senior managers."