Misleading Telegraph article blaming solicitors' costs for NHS financial issues

I was very disheartened to read the recent article in the Telegraph commenting on the cost of clinical negligence claims to the NHS. The title of the article was “Medical Blunders cost NHS millions” but the tone was as far removed from the headline as I think it is possible to get.

I found the article very difficult to read and also really quite misleading. Whilst a number of people were quoted who act for Claimants and the NHS alike, the overall feel was one of blame on solicitors for having such high fees.

The level of damages and what those damages represent to the victims of medical negligence and their families was absent from the vast majority of the article with a small reference at the end of the article to a very sad case dealing with a young mother who has been left severely physically and cognitively damaged by a mistake. A mistake which has effected not only her life but the life of her whole family.

There was, however, no discussion about what the damages in that case would mean in terms of changing her life and enabling her to move from a residential home back to living with her family. I felt that there was no recognition of the fact that this was a young woman of only 24 who was married and starting a family; she had her whole life ahead of her and was undoubtedly looking forward to motherhood. That has all been taken away from her by a medical bundler.

She is now in a residential home and, at 24 years of age, this is not something which her family had probably ever thought about. Compensation in this matter will no doubt be significant but that is to ensure that she is able to live with her family, something we probably all take for granted, in a house suitably adapted to meet her needs.

Compensation will also be needed to fund round-the-clock care and to compensate her for the fact that she will never be able to work again or support her daughter.

I found the whole thing really one-sided and worry that it will put people who have been genuinely injured by medical mistake off from pursuing the matter for fear of being blamed for causing financial problems for the NHS.

One of the graphics which I found particularly difficult to understand was a pie chart the Telegraph had complied [pictured left] showing how much money had been paid to 10 law firms by the NHS.

The pie chart was meant to demonstrate the 10 top firms who were paid individual invoices of more than £25,000 by the NHS. The pie chart, however, was totally misleading and I for one was very concerned to note that there was no distinction made between invoices being paid for client compensation and those being paid for lawyers costs.

A quick look at this pie chart though by anyone in the industry would point out that the vast majority of invoices have been paid to firms instructed by the NHS to defend claims. The invoices paid in these circumstances contain no compensation for the individuals at all and are simply the costs of those lawyers who the NHS are choosing to instruct.

Of the firms noted on the pie chart, three of them are recognised Claimant firms whilst seven are firms who are instructed by the NHS.

I feel very strongly that this article was representing a view that the Claimant firms are to blame, quoting various examples of relatively low levels of compensation with high lawyers' costs. However, from the Telegraph’s own pie chart, £170.1m was paid to the Claimant firm representing a mixture of compensation and lawyers costs compared with £331.8m to firms instructed by the NHS representing lawyers costs only.

Surely if the NHS wants to ensure costs are kept to a minimum then they should be considering the costs of the firms they themselves instruct which are more than double the amount paid out in compensation and Claimant lawyers costs.