Pernicious authority and poor administration or just bad journalism?

The 2DayFM radio presenters at the heart of the pregnancy-hoax furore generating columns of press and hours of radio and television time in the last weeks of 2012 have been condemned almost universally for what they clearly believed would be a hoax without consequences beyond its ‘fun’ (as they saw it) origins. The pair ran a gauntlet of press, public and parliamentary criticism, as well as facing interviews by Sydney police, a request to NSW police authorities reportedly having been sent by their United Kingdom counterparts.

Yet in so many respects the tragedy of Jacintha Saldanha’s death, her suicide being a consequence that few, if any, could have anticipated, has (rightly) cast such a pall over the matter that in turn it has obscured what happened on the evening in question.

Certainly the state of mind endured by a human being which leads to their envisioning the ending of their life as the only saving and salvation is, to the living, almost beyond imagining. That someone is brought to such a state of despair as to end her own life is unutterably sad, just as the death of anyone before their time is tragic for those left behind, particularly where loved ones remain with questions compounding their grief. When children – youngsters or teenagers – are left motherless (or fatherless), the tragedy is taken even more beyond bounds. This is so in the case of Jacintha Saldanha, the nurse who answered the phone, then took her life.

That this outcome was not on the minds of those involved is confirmed in the initial reaction of one of the individuals impersonated by the radio presenters. Charles Windsor’s response was to enter into the spirit of the hoax (as he clearly interpreted it) or at least to see it as cause for an amused – and perhaps amusing – riposte. Under the heading ‘Charles jokes about prank call’, his words were reported as: ‘How do you know I'm not a radio station?’ ‘Commenting for the first time’ about the prospect of his becoming a grandfather, Charles Windsor said he was ‘thrilled’ at the news of his son and daughter-in-law’s forthcoming child, and (according to the media) ‘poked fun at’ the 2DayFM presenters.

This all poses the question as to whether those at the forefront of the criticism (leading it and adding to it) heard the exchanges making up the call from Sydney radio station to London hospital, or read the transcript. The transcript is readily available, published with medical details omitted:

‘Hospital: Hello. Good morning.

‘Mel Greig, pretending to be the Queen: Oh Hello there, could I please speak to Kate, my granddaughter?

‘Hospital: Oh yes, just hold on a moment

‘Michael Christian: Are they putting us through?

‘Mel Greig: Yes

‘Christian: [laughs] If this has worked, it's the easiest prank call we've ever made.

Your accent sucked by the way. [laughs]

‘Greig: I'm not used to playing old 80-year-olds.

‘“Queen”: Kate my darling, are you there.

‘Nurse: Good morning ma'am, this is a nurse speaking. How may I help you?

‘”Queen”: Hello, I'm just after my granddaughter Kate, I wanted to see how her little tummy bug is going.

‘Nurse: She's sleeping at the moment [gives details of her treatment and condition]

‘”Queen”: OK, I'll just feed my little corgis then. [Christian barks in the background pretending to be a corgi] When is a good time to come and visit her, because I'm the Queen and I need a lift down there. Prince Charles, Charles.

‘Christian, pretending to be Prince of Wales: Mummy, is everything OK?

‘”Queen”: Oh wait my Charles, when can you take me to the hospital Charles?

‘”Charles”: When will it be alright to come down and see her? Maybe in the morning, if that's ok?

‘Nurse: I would suggest that any time after nine o'clock would be suitable, because the doctor will be in in the morning, and will just be getting her freshened up in the morning. I would think any time after nine.

‘”Charles”: Is Wills still there, or has he gone home? I haven't spoken to him yet.

‘Nurse: He went home at about half past nine, probably about nine o'clock last night.

‘”Charles”: Lovely, but they're all ok, everything's all right?

‘Nurse: Yes [gives more medical details] I think it's difficult sleeping in a strange bed as well.

‘”Charles”: Yes, of course, it's hardly the Palace is it?

‘”Queen”: It's nothing like the Palace is it Charles. When are you going to walk those bloody corgis?

‘”Charles”: Mumsy, I'll go and take the dogs outside.

‘”Queen”": I need to go visit Kate in the morning. My dear, thank you so much. Thank you. Bye

‘”Charles”: Bye

[Phone call ends]

[Laughter]

‘Greig: She was giving us real information!

‘Christian: Mumsy, I think they believed everything we just said.

‘Greig: I am the Queen, bow for me, bow for me.

‘Christian: Bow for you and your terrible accent.’

Putting to one side what so many class as the crass nature of the call, two aspects stand out. First, that the call is put through immediately to the ward. Secondly, that the ward nurse immediately gives out details of the patient’s medical condition. This raises at once the question whether the hospital had a protocol to be followed by staff when responding to telephone enquiries. In light of the immediacy of both responses, and the responses themselves, at first and second glance it may appear not.

Does this seem odd?

Everyday television viewers of soap opera, serials and series centred on hospitals or raising any matters medical, along with readers of crime or police procedurals, thrillers and their like knows that when hospitals field telephone calls from seekers of patient information, callers receive a bland response. Never, as it appears on such programmes and in the novels, is an enquirer – whoever it may be – put through without question to the patient’s ward. Never, as it seems, is medical information imparted. Always, as it appears, comes a bland response. Without crucial caller identification, the most said is ‘condition stable’ or ‘resting quietly’ or some similar form of ‘rote’ words.

Are these novels and programmes based in reality, or are they pure fiction, written without reference to what happens in the real world?

Although fiction is ‘made up’ stories, mostly accepted as tales related to no real characters, compositions involving people constructed entirely out of the writers’ imagination, unless it is science fiction viewers generally require some adherence to reality. However multifaceted in storyline, absurd the character or plot, soap opera, police procedurals, crime stories and hospital romances are expected to be anchored in some notion of what is real. The narrative, however exotic, has some authenticity, some relationship to what happens in the universe.

In any event, medical confidentiality and privacy laws have application or at least might be expected to do so in the real world. Albeit the United Kingdom has no explicit formal ‘right to privacy’, the Human Rights Act1998 (UK) incorporates the European Human Rights Convention which confirms a right for ‘everyone’ to ‘respect’ for her or his ‘private and family life’. The confidentiality of medical records is affirmed where a relevant relationship exists between the subject and the holder of that information, as is clearly so where a patient receives treatment whilst resident in a hospital. Additionally, ‘sensitive personal data’ including a person’s ‘physical or mental health or condition’ is covered by the Data Protection Act 1998 (UK) which, if seen as possibly applicable to 2DayFM (the purpose of NSW Police enquiries) some might also see as possibly applicable to the hospital?

Returning, then, to the telephone call that had such a tragic outcome, could it really be assumed there was no telephone enquiry protocol in place? More probably, the opinion that this is unlikely is correct, for otherwise a hospital may place itself in a vulnerable position in regard to all existing and prospective patients. Surely that cannot be so.

Whether or not ‘privacy’ rules, confidentiality of medical records and information must be governed by hospital protocols. Any hospital treating any patients at all, and with any patients in residence at any time, must be taken to adopt a standard form of response to telephone calls, telephone enquirers and telephone enquiries. Such a protocol would, one may suggest, be unlikely to include provisions that contemplate putting calls through without pause, or transmitting medical information without query.

What, then, is one to make of the transcript which so evidently appears to indicate otherwise?

That there was no questioning of the callers – neither initially at reception nor at the ward nurses station – must be based in some reasoning. Was it class, status and ‘authority’ – as in royalty trumps protocol?

This is, perhaps, the answer.

A more recent controversy gives support to such a contention.

On Monday 14 January 2013, the UK press reported on ‘secret papers’ showing the ‘extent of senior royals’ veto’ over Parliamentary Bills, after a court order revealed ‘how approval of Queen and Prince Charles is sought on range of bills’. This may seem a mile away from the giving out of information to preposterous impostors of sovereign and son, in accents unlikely to pass muster at Oxford or Eton. Yet the authority wielded in a telephone call fielded by nurses never having met or spoken with the real thing may be understood in a context where royal status and authority do indeed rule the roost.

When the dimensions of such authority in a democratic parliamentary system are so exposed, perhaps it is no surprise that a mimicked authority and impersonated status overruled staff caution?

The ‘secret papers’ disclosure reveals that Elizabeth Windsor was ‘asked for consent’ on a wide range of bills, giving rise to a ‘growing concern in parliament at a lack of transparency over the royals’ role in lawmaking’. Over the period preceding the application for a court order, at least thirty-nine Bills were subjected to ‘royal scrutiny’, with the veto power employed ‘to torpedo proposed legislation’ on a wide range of issues, including that relating to decisions about the declaration and progress of war:

‘… released following a court order [the Whitehall pamphlet] shows ministers and civil servants are obliged to consult the Queen and Prince Charles in greater detail and over more areas of legislation than was previously understood.

‘New laws required to receive the seal of approval from the Queen or Prince Charles cover issues from higher education and paternity pay to identity cards and child maintenance. In one instance the Queen completely vetoed the Military Actions against Iraq Bill in 1999, a private member’s bill that sought to transfer the power to authorise military strikes against Iraq from the monarch to parliament …’

In turn, Charles Windsor is reported as having vetoed legislation ‘on more than a dozen occasions’, with civil servants being warned that obtaining consent ‘can cause delays to legislation’. Even amendments to bills ‘may have to be run past the royals’, with the Guardian editorialising that all this may ‘help explain why ministers appear to pay close attention to the views of senior royals’.

One MP was reported as saying that the eyes of those ‘believing the Queen has a [solely] ceremonial role’ are being opened, whilst the legal scholar who sought the disclosure observed:

‘There has been an implication that these prerogative powers are quaint and sweet but actually there is real influence and real power, albeit unaccountable.’

Meanwhile, the director of Republic, campaigning for the head of state to be elected by popular vote, was calling for ‘full disclosure of the details of the occasions when royal consent has been refused’, adding:

‘The suggestion in these documents that the Queen withheld consent for a private member’s bill on such an important issue as going to war beggars belief. We need to know whether laws have been changed as the result of a private threat to withhold that consent.’

Although the role of the monarch in the British system is believed to be purely formal, or at least that was so until this expose, clearly there is far more to it than pomp and circumstance, tiara and pageantry, spectacle and display. Further, underlying all this showiness and splendour, to the woman and man in the street power is implicit in title, authority and status inherent not only in birth but, as the radio transcript shows, in marriage. Hence, in the ‘hoax’ call, the key words appear to be: ‘Kate, my granddaughter’ and ‘my granddaughter Kate’, along with ‘Kate my darling’ and (later, from ‘Charles’) ‘Mummy, is everything OK?’ For the professional in the hospital wards and corridors, not even the statement: ‘It’s the Queen here’, or ‘It’s “we” calling,’ or ‘I (sic), the Crown, speak,’ is (apparently) required.

When the hoax was revealed, listeners readily detected a lack of authenticity in the call and the callers. Yet to be fair to the call’s recipients, they saw concern and the seeking of familial reassurance at the heart of the enquiry. This is what the words and the voices said to them. More significantly, the words and the voices said ‘authority lies with me’ and ‘I have a right to know.’ In other words, royalty speaks.

Going back, then, to the case of the ‘secret’ dossier and the royal ‘right to veto’, this provides some insight into relations between monarch and subject, state and head of state, authority and subordinate. For if the power of the Crown is such that ministers go begging for consent to bills and endeavour to hide this from the public, can it be any surprise that ‘ordinary’ mortals bow to the authority of the (purported) royal voice?

Anyone seeking support and information about suicide prevention can contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467.