Concern over 'rogue dentist' affair

Health Minister Paul Goggins has told the BBC he is deeply concerned about the eight-year delay in stopping a dentist, who has now been struck off for fraud and malpractice, from working in Northern Ireland.

Mr Goggins, in a statement to Tuesday night's Spotlight programme, has said he is going to review procedures which allowed rogue dentist Bruce Kelso to continue to work years after health officials began investigating him.

Spotlight reveals that Bruce Kelso was first quizzed by health authorities in NI as far back as 1993.

But after they found definitive evidence of fraud in 1997 - and then evidence of bad treatment - they did not manage to prevent him working until 2005.

The director of Dental Health Services for the Eastern Health and Social Services Board, Will Maxwell, admitted that Mr Kelso had compromised patients' welfare in the intervening years.

Mr Maxwell said: "I think that would have to be accepted. I think undoubtedly he had probably compromised the best care of patients while he has been working."

The health authorities blame the failure of a police fraud investigation for the delay in acting decisively against Mr Kelso, but conceded that with hindsight they would do things differently.

Last September, the General Dental Council erased Bruce Kelso's name from the dental register - they judged him guilty of multiple counts of fraud and malpractice.

Duncan Rudkin, the chief executive of the GDC said: "There is no doubt that this was a bad dentist, a rogue dentist if you like..."

Complaints

But Spotlight found that the GDC had five other complaints about Kelso between 2001 and 2003 but also failed to intervene and stop him from working.

The GDC explained they simply didn't know about the other evidence against Kelso until the Eastern Health Board told them in 2004. Kelso was finally suspended in April 2005.

The GDC did not determine the exact scale of the fraud involved, but health officials carried out an audit of one six-month period in 1999 and believe £15,000 was defrauded in that time alone.

Extrapolating that over, say 10 years, and the figure matures into £300,000.

The Health Minister Paul Goggins tells Spotlight: "I will also be vigorously exploring every avenue to see how any loss of funds that may have been incurred as a result of negligence or inappropriate claims, can be recovered."

Kelso who is in receipt of a full NHS pension is now believed to be living close to Monaco, in the south of France.

The GDC has confirmed that he can apply to be re-registered as a dentist in nine months, though he might then face other charges.