NHS negligence legal fee cap

NHS NEGLIGENCE LEGAL FEE CAP
Sir, I agree with Dr Stephen Pacey’s letter (Feb 16, and report, Feb 15) about the government’s proposal to cap the costs of lawyers in NHS negligence cases. Doctors, just like lawyers, are human and sometimes make mistakes. The way to improve standards and change behaviour is to learn from mistakes. Within the NHS there needs to be a greater emphasis on learning from mistakes at a national level. After a claim for negligence involving treatment provided by the NHS has concluded, there should be a far-reaching, and fearless, review of what went wrong, in order to avoid such errors in future.

It is pleasing that Jeremy Hunt, the health and social care secretary, sees the value of this approach; if only those in the Ministry of Justice could follow suit instead of insisting on attacking lawyers as being the source of the problem.

Richard Lodge
Partner, Kingsley Napley LLP

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