Welsh Conservatives have responded to the publication of today’s Tawel Fan report by the organisation HASCASS.
Yesterday serious concerns emerged over the independence of HASCASS after it was unveiled a number of key figures in the organisation had close links to the Labour Party and Welsh Government.
Today’s report intriguingly states the Investigation Panel could not replicate the specific findings of abuse from any of the earlier investigations.
The Tawel Fan ward at Glan Clwyd Hospital, Denbighshire, was closed in 2013 and an initial investigation by Donna Ockenden exposed ‘institutional abuse’ on the ward.
Commenting, Clwyd West AM, Darren Millar, said:
“Many will describe today’s report into Tawel Fan as a whitewash and will question the independence of the process which has led to its publication.
“Any organisation with links to the Welsh Government or the Labour Party involved in sensitive work of this kind should have a duty to disclose that to stakeholders upfront. The failure to do so in this case has given rise to a serious breach of trust and undermined the confidence of the Tawel Fan families that this was a genuine quest for truth.
“We are now almost four and a half years on from the closure of the ward and yet instead of answers the Tawel Fan families have even more questions about the care of their loved ones.
“The Tawel Fan families and the people of North Wales deserve better and that’s why we need a cross-party Assembly inquiry to ensure that we get to the bottom of what happened once and for all.”
He added:
“Some will suggest that the Welsh Government is more interested in protecting the reputation of its Ministers and softening the impact of investigations than actually finding the truth about what happened at Tawel Fan.”
Responding to the report, Shadow Health Secretary, Angela Burns AM, said:
“The Tawel Fan scandal shocked the country and the families of those affected deserved much more than a long-awaited report which sadly appears to pose more questions than answers.
“When compared with the initial work undertaken by Donna Ockenden who exposed ‘institutional abuse’ on the ward, the findings in today’s report cause concern of a different nature.
“Transparency and honesty are vital in all areas of public service delivery – particularly when scandals hit our most treasured public service.
“For the sake of the families who have been put through years of anguish in the quest for answers, an Assembly inquiry should be established to review both reports and the reasons for the contrasting conclusions.”