Minister tells NHS trusts to cease distributing leaflets subsidised by solicitors’ adverts

hospital ward

NHS trusts have been ordered to remove ‘no win, no fee’ adverts for personal injury lawyers from the leaflets distributed in casualty wards.

Many NHS trusts allow the distribution of the advice leaflets, the production of which are subsidised by advertising from personal injury firms.

According to a report in ‘The Times’, health minister Simon Burns will be writing to NHS chief executive Sir David Nicholson, to demand they follow the rules.

Burns told the Times “Patients should be able to focus on getting better without having to be hounded by lawyers or adverts displayed in A&E departments. I will ask Sir David Nicholson to write to hospitals to remind them that it is not acceptable to display these adverts.”

Andrew Bridgen, the Tory MP for North West Leicestershire, has also put down a parliamentary early day motion attacking the deals, which he claims have fuelled the rise of Britain’s compensation culture.