Provision of an independent Freedom to Speak Up Guardian Service

NHS Highland have a critical and urgent need to establish a Guardian / Speak up service by July 2020, as recommended in the Sturrock review, to provide an independent channel for colleague concerns to be raised where other channels have not worked or cannot be used. This is also aligned to how we wil implement the revised National Whistleblowing standards in Highland in July 2020. NHS Highland do not have the capacity, time or skills to set up an internal speak up service, and the culture issues experienced mean that an externally hosted service is critical at this time to built trust of the service. We have reviewed the market and the only established provider of this service that we have identified with appropriate and relevant NHS specific experience is The Guardian Service. The Guardian Service have extensive experience in setting up and running this service across many years and we have testimony from other NHS trusts in England and Wales who already work with them. Their approach of working in partnership with the organisation and key stakeholders is essential to the service working effectively and learning from the issues which are raised.