Ian Paterson: Disgraced ex-surgeon stripped of £1m pension pot after he was jailed for 20 years over unnecessary procedures

According to The Sunday Times, Health Secretary Wes Streeting has taken he unprecedented move to remove Ian Paterson’s taxpayers-funded pension pot under rules which allow NHS benefits to be removed as a result of criminal negligent or fraudulent acts. Paterson was handed a 20-year long prison sentence in 2017 after being convicted of 17 counts of wounding with intent and three counts of unlawful wounding.

The stripping of pension pots are unprecedented moves but have been seen in other sectors in the past. Disgraced former police officers Wayne Couzens and David Carrick were stripped of their pensions after being convicted of serious offences. Couzens was found guilty of the murder of Sarah Everard in 2021 and is currently serving a whole-life sentence, while Carrick was sentenced to life imprisonment for multiple counts of rape in 2023.

Paterson undertook unnecessary procedures between 1997 and 2011 while employed by the Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust and practising in the independent sector at Spire Parkway and Spire Little Aston in Birmingham. Paterson is said to have told hundreds of woman and some men that they had cancer when they did not, subjecting them to unnecessary test, surgery and chemotherapy.

He also undertook an experimental technique on some patients, claiming that he could remove tumours from their breasts but leave some breast tissue. Hundreds of woman who underwent the procedure have since died, with coroners in the West Midland ordering inquests into 82 as they “suspect that some of those deaths may be unnatural”.

The inquests for 62 of these patients are due to open later this week. The remaining 20 cases will take place at a later date.