Letby trust pays £1.4m damages to ex CEO

Letby trust pays £1.4m damages to ex CEO A former NHS chief executive has been awarded £1.4m in damages after suing the health service for unfair dismissal. Dr Susan Gilby was forced out of her chief executive role at the Countess of Chester NHS Trust Dr Susan Gilby took the Countess of Chester NHS Trust to court after being suspended in December 2022. The compensation is one of the largest payments the NHS has ever made to a former employee. The final cost to the taxpayer - including court costs - could be around £3m after the trust refused offers to avoid the case going to court. Gilby told the BBC she was relieved the case was over and that this "was never about the money." The Countess of Chester NHS Trust - where Lucy Letby worked - confirmed that a settlement had been agreed. The compensation payment comes after an employment tribunal ruled in February last year that board members at the trust had conspired to remove her from her job. Gilby had accused the trust's chairman, Ian Haythornthwaite, of bullying and harassment. In response, Haythornthwaite, working alongside three other directors, had set up Project Countess, to force Gilby out. Gilby, 62, said one of the trust's directors, Ros Fallon, took her to a pub on a Friday afternoon in October 2022 and told her it was "time for you to go". "She said: 'And if you don't agree to go, we will start a process against you'. She was unable to tell me what that process would be." Gilby said she was initially offered a pay-off - the equivalent of 16 months of her salary - while she did "a non-job" with NHS England. But she said the offer had a sting in the tail. "I had to drop my concerns, drop my grievance, about the behaviours of Ian Haythornthwaite, and for me, that was an absolute red line. "The idea that I would walk away and this would never be mentioned again, was absolutely unpalatable to me. "I wouldn't have been able to live with myself knowing that I had taken effectively a bribe." Gilby had been appointed chief executive in September 2018 just weeks after Lucy Letby, who worked at the trust, had been arrested. She was praised for guiding the trust through the pandemic, but in 2021, Haythornthwaite was appointed chairman and Gilby says her job became increasingly difficult. Following her refusal to accept the trust's offer to walk away quietly, in December 2022, she was suspended. Gilby promptly resigned and launched legal action. The tribunal found she had never been presented with the reasons for her suspension and that the trust had instead "built up a sham case" against her. As well as the damages, the trust is likely to have to pay a substantial portion of her legal fees, on top of the costs of their own lawyers and barristers. The total cost to the NHS, to taxpayers, is estimated therefore to be...

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