‘Flawed’ claim over heart unit analysis

Supporters’ group Save Our Surgery (SOS) has been at the High Court to argue that the scoring system used to assess rival units was unfair and, if done correctly and the details revealed, Leeds may have beaten Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital.

But Fenella Morris QC, for Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, accused SOS of a “fundamentally flawed” comparison.

The group’s analysis was “riddled with inaccuracies”, she said.

“It amounts to little more than a self-interested re-scoring of all the criteria in the claimant’s favour on the basis of unsubstantiated hypotheticals,” she said.

“The claimant’s submissions based upon this purported analysis – that disclosure of the sub-scores would have revealed, or would have allowed Leeds to reveal, Newcastle’s inferiority – are bound to fail.”

The Newcastle trust had not intended to get involved in the judicial review, but felt it had to because “Leeds were seeking to support their challenge by making statements about the trust which were inaccurate and professionally derogatory”.

On behalf of SOS, Philip Havers QC said it was never Leeds’s intention to criticise the Freeman and that he regretted it if it had been interpreted that way.

He added the case came down to whether it was right that the sub-scores were not revealed until after the decision was taken.

The judgement is expected by early March.