NEW CEO OF CWM TAF MORGANNWG HEALTH BOARD, PAUL MEARS, HOLDS SEVERAL CONSULTANT POSITIONS WITH FIRMS WHO HELP PRIVATE HEALTHCARE COMPANIES PROFIT FROM NHS CONTRACTS.
MEARS WELCOMED PRIVATISATION IN HIS LAST POSITION AS HEAD OF YEOVIL HOSPITAL IN SOMERSET DESPITE UNION UPROAR.
DRAKE CONSULTANCY LTD WAS SET-UP IN MEARS’ NAME TO MAKE MONEY SELLING “STRATEGY ADVICE TO CLIENTS IN THE NHS AND THE PRIVATE SECTOR”.
By Mark S Redfern.
The recently appointed CEO of the Cwm Taf Morgannwg Health Board has his own private consultancy firm, through which he advises pharmaceutical and healthcare companies on how they can turn a profit from the NHS.
Paul Mears set up Drake Consultancy Ltd in 2018, allowing him to operate as an “Independent management consultant” for various major firms. One of these was the notorious management consultancy firm McKinsey & Co, where Mears worked as a Senior Consultant. McKinsey is a company instrumental in the privatisation of NHS services.
As well as McKinsey, Mears has also worked for other consultancy firms in recent years, although he says he has not worked for the NHS in this time and will not provide consultancy services once he takes up his post with Cwm Taf in September of this year.
However Cat Hobbs, Director of the anti-privatisation campaign We Own It, says the appointment should be opposed, telling voice.wales: “The conflict of interest here is blatantly clear. He should never have been appointed – he should be replaced with someone who doesn’t have this conflict of interest.”
McKinsey has been consistently calling on the government to open up the NHS to private businesses, making their intentions clear as far back as 1977 when the consultancy called for NHS patients to be charged for their treatment.
The company has had such strong input in the privatisation of the NHS in recent years that even the Mail on Sunday labelled McKinsey “The firm that hijacked the NHS” after advising on legislation in 2012 which introduced an internal market within the NHS, making McKinsey’s private sector clients even wealthier.
In an online job post advertising his skills, Mears describes his time at the company: “Developing business opportunities through my healthcare network, supporting proposal writing and client pitches, scoping project briefs”.
It is not just his association with McKinsey that should worry those who oppose NHS privatisation. Mears also has a proven track record of welcoming business interests with open arms in previous roles with the NHS, as demonstrated by his time at the helm of Yeovil Hospital as Chief Executive.
He caused uproar when 350 maintenance and cleaning jobs were privatised in February 2018, with union activists opposing the move having a scheduled union meeting to discuss proceedings banned by management.
Since his time at Yeovil Hospital, Mears has also worked as a Senior Advisor at ZPB Associates. He starred in a promotional video for the consultant firm where he promoted “strategic partnerships”, saying: “Pharma companies need to be an integral part of the solution.”
His own firm through which he works, Drake Consultancy, is a business venture that “provides strategy advice to clients in the NHS and the private sector to understand the healthcare market” and which markets its services on the back of Mears’ reputation. Private healthcare and big pharmaceutical firms traditionally use consultancy firms to get access to lucrative NHS contracts.
We Own It director Cat Hobbs spoke to voice.wales and condemned the decision to appoint Mears:
“This is utterly outrageous. McKinsey is worming its way into our NHS, after decades of undermining it. This is what the revolving door looks like.”
“Who does this man represent? Does he represent patients, NHS staff and the public? Or does he represent unaccountable consultants who’ve been trying to privatise our NHS for decades?”
“This is entirely inappropriate, and during a pandemic on this scale, frankly insulting. 84% of the public support our NHS being in public hands – run for the benefit of everyone, not a tiny clique of private companies and their shareholders.”
The National Health Service is a treasured institution to the general public with 84% of the public wanting to see it rest in public hands rather than being run by private healthcare companies, as is the norm in America, where over 27million people have no health cover.
Countries with socialised healthcare systems like the NHS spend less on their citizens and yield longer life expectancies than places like the US who have private healthcare, a system McKinsey seeks to emulate in the UK, a 2012 report found.
A report by the Centre for Health and Public Interest published in 2014 concluded that £4.5 billion of public money was wasted every year by running an internal market within the NHS, funds desperately needed to be invested in patient care even more so during a pandemic.
Len Arthur, Chair of the Save Royal Glamorgan Campaign in the area governed by CTM Health Board, said: “The successful campaign to save the A&E at the Royal Glamorgan Hospital – SRGAE – is not going to go away. There is still work to be done to defend our NHS and social care as a service free at the point of need and oppose any more erosion by private provision.”
“We are setting up a permanent action group late summer to ensure that our win stays in place after the new CEO takes over and to continue defending the maternity and paediatric services at the hospital despite what the rationalising South Wales Programme states.”
“The campaign has already requested a meeting with the officers including the new CEO,” said Arthur.
Paul Mears denied there was a conflict of interest involved, saying in a statement to voice.wales: “I have been working as an independent management consultant through my own company, Drake Consultancy, since May 2018. During this time I have not been employed by any NHS organisation.”
“When I take up my post as Chief Executive at Cwm Taf Morgannwg Health Board in September 2020 I will no longer work as a management consultant and the contracts I have had with external companies will end as I will be returning to the NHS in a full time capacity.”
@genericredfern
