Case ref: 202308861
NHS organisation: NHS National Services Scotland
Subject: Complaint handling
Date: November 2024
Summary
C raised a whistleblowing concern with the Board about governance breaches and administrative non-compliance. The Board undertook an investigation under the National Whistleblowing Standards. They partially upheld C's concerns and made a recommendation.
C raised a complaint with the INWO that the Board had failed to investigate the specific incidents they highlighted when they raised concerns. Instead, C said that the Board had looked at the issues holistically. C asked the INWO to consider how the Board had handled their concerns and whether this was in line with the expectations of the Standards.
We considered information provided by C and the Board, including the investigation file. We found that the Board conducted a thorough investigation in line with the Standards and exhibited areas of good practice in their handling of the concern. Their investigation included the specific incidents C raised. We found that there was potential for improvement in the level of detail provided in the response letter to C and provided feedback to the Board about this.
Our decision in this case was to not uphold the complaint.