“Keep this audit to ourselves for the time being”
The former Chief Medical Officer of NHS Sussex asked a colleague had prepared a report on the number of children being prescribed puberty blockers by local doctors to “keep this audit to ourselves for the time being”.
On 7 May 2021 Dr Elizabeth Gill was emailed the result of an audit collated by Dr Stephen Pike, the Clinical Programme Lead in Medicines Management and Deputy Medical Director Sussex Clinical Commissioning Groups within NHS Sussex. The audit indicated there were eight under 16s receiving puberty blockers prescribed by doctors within NHS Sussex, five of whom had been treated by the now closed Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust in London. Three of whom had come to NHS Sussex GP surgeries through Helen Webberley’s offshore private practice GenderGP. There were a further twelve 16 and 17 year olds in NHS Sussex’s care also on blockers.
Pike’s work appears to have been partly prompted by the Dec 2020 High Court ruling (overturned in Sep 2021) which decided children under 16 were unlikely to be able to give informed consent about puberty blockers. It also followed activity initiated by Dr Sarah Redvers, the Named GP for Safeguarding within NHS Sussex. In August 2020 Redvers had raised formal concerns about the prescribing of hormones to young people by a trans activist GP in Brighton called Dr Sam Hall. Redvers’ initially sent a report to NHS Sussex (which she was advised to escalate to NHS England) and then to the General Medical Council. Her concerns were badly mishandled, leading to the likelihood that patients were harmed over a number of years.
Keep This Audit To Ourselves
In Pike’s covering email to Dr Gill, he set out his headline findings and suggested it was “useful data to discuss a way forward”. The email was cc’d to Michael Brown, NHS Sussex’s Head of Safeguarding and Dr Sarah Redvers. Pike asked Redvers to “check… for any changes that need to be made with regard to the recent court case and consent. Hopefully we can agree this at the first transgender group meeting as we need to get information out to GPs”.
Instead of getting information out to GPs, it appears Gill wanted to apply the brakes. Three hours after receiving Pike’s data, Gill replied “Thank you. This is really helpful. Looking forward to catching up with you next week. Please can we keep this audit to ourselves for the time being.”
The email came to light during Sarah Redvers employment tribunal against NHS Sussex and Adam Doyle, its former CEO. Dr Redvers claims she was victimised after she raised her safeguarding concerns about Sam Hall. It appears from evidence we have heard over the past seven days that her whistleblowing was mishandled by senior management, potentially putting patient safety at risk. After Dr Hall put in a complaint, Redvers became the subject of an unfair investigation, and it was this which led to her eventual claim for constructive dismissal (full story here).
The response to Gill’s request was interesting. Pike replied: “I agree. Only sent to you and safeguarding (only others are the two pharmacists Michelle Barnard and Gill Ells who carried out the audit…)”
Redvers wrote: “All comments acknowledged, thank you… I have been having a think about how we assist children, their families and
GPs and will feedback at the meeting from the safeguarding team.”
On 13 May, Michael Brown forwarded Pike’s data to two colleagues who were going to be at the “transgender group meeting”. After Brown’s 13 May email, the trail goes cold until 14 April 2025 when Brown re-forwards the email to Jo Tomlinson, a member of his safeguarding team.
Suppression of Data
On Wednesday this week, Adam Doyle was asked about the Pike audit during his second day of evidence to the tribunal. Dr Redvers’ barrister Chris Milson suggested that Dr Gill had successfully “suppressed” Pike’s data “not by weeks, not by months, but by years. Do you agree?”
Doyle replied that he “can’t speak to what Elizabeth did on the back of the audit”.
“Do you say it wasn’t brought to your attention by the Chief Medical Officer” asked Milsom.
Doyle waffled about being “aware… there were some concerns raised about differing patients.”
“So you did know about the audit in May 2021”, said Milsom.
Doyle said he couldn’t say one way or the other given it was “five years ago” and therefore difficult to remember.
Milsom asked Doyle if he agreed that “suppressing an audit” would “conflict” with NHS Surrey’s statutory duty to “promote the use in the health service of evidence obtained from research” – ie, it would be breaking the law.
“If there was evidence of suppression” replied Doyle, “then yes”.
Dr Gill is not scheduled to give evidence during this tribunal. NHS Sussex have not called as a witness anyone working for a regulated profession, something which Milsom has drawn the tribunal’s attention to, noting that members of regulated professions are bound by a “duty of candour”.
In the absence of Dr Gill from the tribunal I have contacted NHS Sussex asking what Gill did with the Pike data after asking him to keep it between themselves.
Doyle will finish giving his evidence today. I have written about his first day in the witness chair “NHS exec skewers own legal case” here. Live tweets of Redvers v NHS Sussex and Adam Doyle are being provided by Tribunal Tweets. You can find their substack page here and read them on X here.
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