The heavy price of truth: was a £21 million inquiry worth it?
In short: When a trusted doctor murdered hundreds of patients, the public demanded answers. But how do you measure the value of a four-year investigation that cost millions? Lady Justice Janet Smith explores the moral and systemic weight of uncovering a monster's crimes versus the need for institutional reform.
The Shipman Inquiry was launched following the 1998 arrest of Harold Shipman, a general practitioner in Hyde near Manchester. While Shipman was initially convicted of murdering 15 patients, police suspicions suggested a much larger scale of violence. Investigations ultimately confirmed a death toll of 218 to 280 patients overseen by Shipman. To reach this conclusion, Lady Justice Janet Smith led a massive factual assessment of 1,000 cases over nearly four years. The inquiry's scope was initially contested. It was originally intended to be a private investigation, but families of the victims successfully challenged this through judicial review, demanding a public forum. Furthermore, the government's primary goal was to identify and quickly improve the systems of control and monitoring that failed to stop Shipman.
However, Smith faced a dilemma: focus on the mechanics of healthcare oversight or the visceral need for the families to know the extent of the crimes. Smith ultimately chose the latter, embarking on a labor-intensive factual investigation that doubled both the inquiry's duration from two years to four and its cost to nearly £21 million. She argued that while the government wanted rapid systemic fixes, the residents of Hyde required the truth about who Shipman killed. For Smith, the inquiry was 'worth it' because it provided a necessary factual reckoning for the victims' families, even as it served the broader purpose of identifying systemic failures in medical monitoring.
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Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: The Shipman Inquiry: Was it worth it? [Part 2] by Lady Justice Janet Smith
- Also: Part Two - 'The Shipman Inquiry: Was it worth it?' and 'My experience of inquiries as inquisitor and victim'
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