I have made a start on writing up the paper summarising the project on NEDs in the public sector which Thom and I have been working on for some time. Pulling together the literature review I came across a paper from 1995* that quotes from the 1989 White Paper "Working for Patients". This White Paper set out the original ideas for NHS reform so was an important document. Peck wrote that the White Paper stated that NEDs should be “chosen for the contribution they can personally make to the effective management of the hospital".
This is rather different from the conception of the NED role in the private sector and I wanted to read the White Paper to set the statement in context and to identify any other indications of how the NED role in the NHS was perceived at that time.
How do you find a copy of a White Paper? First you Google: many, many references to the White Paper, hardly surprising as it led to such important legislation, but no indication of where the original might be found. You'd think you might find it at gov.uk: no, that site only carries publications after May 2010, but it provides a handy link to the National Archives. But try searching for "working with patients" there: no results.
At this point, Thom took over and spent a lot of time emailing people who might be able to lay their hands on a copy. You might expect to find it in the House of Commons library but apparently not. Thom even began to wonder if the document had been suppressed...
As a last resort we decided that it might be worth emailing the authors of the papers that cited the White Paper to see if they could help. I was about to turn back to Google Scholar to see if I knew any of them and list those whose email addresses were readily available when it occurred to me that there were still other libraries to try.
Nipping down to the Bodleian, which was certain to have a copy, would take all day, or even longer, depending on where the document was stored. And my readers ticket had certainly expired as I have rarely used it. I could order a copy via the inter library loan system at Brookes but that would take ages and involve getting authorisation from the head of department. But the ICAEW library might be able to help...
Within an hour I had received a reply from a very helpful librarian at ICAEW. Not only would a lending copy of the White Paper be posted to me immediately but two other publications which might be relevant had been located which I could also borrow.
That's what I call service.
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*Peck, E (1995) The Performance of an NHS Trust Board: Actors' Accounts, Minutes and Observation. British Journal of Management Vol 6., Issue 2, pp. 135-156
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