Disclosure failures at whistleblower's tribunal, hearing told

Rosalind Ranson was the island's medical director between 2019 and 2022

There were "principle failures" in the Manx government's handling of document disclosure at a whistleblower's tribunal, a lawyer has told a hearing.

The Employment and Equality Tribunal has been looking at how documents were disclosed in the case of Dr Rosalind Ranson, who was unfairly dismissed.

The former medical director's lawyer told a hearing a documents search had either been "deficient" or "filtered".

The health department's lawyer said making such a claim was "premature".

The tribunal called the hearing at Douglas's Murray House to look into "troubling issues" regarding the disclosure process in Dr Ranson's case.

It heard the full extent of how many documents were not disclosed was not discovered until Dr Ranson put in a data subject access request, revealing emails that had not previously been revealed.

It was told civil servants gathering the documents for disclosure had only included six email accounts and had failed to add some relevant key words to the search itself, including Dr Ranson's name.

'Matter for other people'

Once saved on a secure drive, the documents were sent to the then Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) chief executive Kathryn Magson for approval, before being sent to the Attorney General's chambers.

The hearing was also told some emails which should have been disclosed were not handed over.

Oliver Segal QC, representing Dr Ranson, said there had been "principle failures in the disclosure" of the documents.

He said a lack of evidence from key witnesses about the disclosure process meant there were "significant unfortunate gaps" in the understanding of the events.

Ms Magson and her then deputy Karen Malone were "obvious people to answer questions about what has happened", he added.

However, Jonathan Wild, representing DHSC, said that as the women were no longer employed by the department, what evidence they gave was a "matter for other people".

He added that some documents listed as not disclosed had in fact been handed over.

The review was also told the findings of private investigators looking into an allegation that a document was "concocted" were not yet complete and would be dealt with at a later date.