A FORMER care manager at South Gloucestershire Council who was in charge during the Winterbourne View scandal has been banned from nursing.

Kevin Christopher Haigh was dismissed from his role as a district manager after a BBC Panorama documentary uncovered horrendous abuse at the Winterbourne View care home.

The private 24-bed hospital in Hambrook was the subject of a national outcry on May 31, 2011, when the BBC Panorama aired undercover footage of staff allegedly torturing vulnerable adult patients.

The programme appeared to show care staff pinning patients down, dousing them with water, slapping them in the face and leaving one woman outside on a concrete pavement.

Following the BBC investigation, 24 patients were transferred from the hospital and it was closed in June 2011.

Haigh, who had responsibilities for the authority’s adult social care team, had been employed by the council since 2003 and was responsible for safeguarding vulnerable adults.

He has now been struck off the nursing register by a Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), after pursuing a career at the Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Trust,

At a hearing in London, earlier this month, Haigh admit to a number of charges of misconduct.

An incident of note involved a member of staff punching a patent to “release himself from a bite”, which was described by another employee as “understandable” during a safeguarding meeting.

Haigh worked as a nurse for one year before handing in his resignation in 2014.  

A watchdog panel has now decided that his name should be removed from the nursing register.

The panel announced: "Mr Haigh failed in his role as district manager to effectively safeguard the patients at Winterbourne View.

"By failing to ensure adequate and timely investigation of incidents, failing to submit safeguarding minutes and investigation reports, and failing to challenge poor decision making in other agencies and individuals, he allowed the status quo to prevail.

"In the case of Winterbourne View, this meant that residents were left in an environment where they were exposed to mistreatment and emotional and physical abuse.

"Whilst he did not bring about this state of affairs, his failings whilst in post meant that opportunities to properly identify the full extent of the institutional abuse at the hospital were missed, resulting in patients being subjected to abuse and placed at unwarranted risk of harm.

"His admitted failures do not relate directly to the provision of clinical care, however he was employed in a senior role in which a high degree of reliance was placed on his carrying out his role to the required standards to ensure that vulnerable patients were protected."