HOW have we got to this situation at FGH?

Where if an action you take or fail to take, contributes to the death of someone, you remain in post?

Most employers would have you out the door never mind give you a chance to err again.

Nor would you be able to see out the remainder of your highly-paid career or wander off into retirement with your pension fully intact.

Not so, it seems, at the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust. Given its recent history, you have to ask: just what do you have to do to get sacked?

It is clear to see why Peter Duffy, the brave consultant urologist who dared put his neck on the line over this issue, decided to quit.

Yet three years on, the hospital’s good work continues to be marred by appalling accounts of loved ones lost, a management in apparent denial, grieving relatives feeling cheated and other staff having to raise the alarm.

Doctors are not infallible. Medical miracles are performed every day at FGH, which never get any publicity. But when senior medical professionals get it wrong, why are they ever given a second chance?

Cases like this make a mockery of the principle that patients come first. The trust hierarchy needs to stop hiding behind press statements and start answering tough questions.