At least two babies might still be alive if senior executives at the Countess of Chester Hospital had heeded the warnings of paediatricians on the unit where Lucy Letby was killing or maiming babies, it can be revealed today.

Both Baby O, a triplet, and his brother, Baby P, were murdered after a so-called Gang of Four raised their suspicions about the link between the nurse’s presence and the deaths they had already witnessed.

And even when the lead consultant, Stephen Brearey, went back to management in the hours after Baby P’s death on June 24, 2016, his request to have Letby taken off the neonatal unit was turned down flat.

Karen Rees, the duty executive in urgent care, is said to have insisted there was ‘no evidence’ against Letby and said she would be ‘happy’ to take responsibility if something happened.

On Oct 23, consultants on the unit decided to flag their concerns to hospital chiefs. An email was sent about the spike in deaths to Nursing Director Alison Kelly and the link with Letby highlighted again, but Dr Ravi Jayaram said they were ‘fobbed off’. He said Mrs Kelly said: ‘It’s unlikely that anything is going on, we’ll see what happens’ and Letby was allowed to continue working. 

Dr Brearey said in evidence: ‘I explained what had happened and said I didn’t want Nurse Letby to come back to work the following day or until this was investigated properly. Karen said no to that, and (that) there was no evidence.

‘The crux of the conversation was that I then put to her ”Was she happy to take responsibility for this decision in view of the fact that myself and consultant colleagues would not be happy with Nurse Letby going to work the following day?”

‘She responded ”Yes, she would be happy”. I said ”Would you be happy if something happened to any of the babies the following day?” She said ”Yes”.

A former hospital employee told the Mail: ‘Management didn’t want to hear it, they didn’t want the bad publicity. Eventually, the consultants forced their hand. They said to the medical director Ian Harvey, ‘if you don’t go to the police, we will.’ There was a lot of dragging of feet. They were frustrated.’ 

Here are the senior NHS executives who could have stopped Letby in her tracks. 

1. CEO: Tony Chambers

Tony Chambers stepped down as the chief executive of the Countess of Chester Hospital after the police launched an inquiry into the baby deaths.

The 57-year-old former nurse was on a salary of £160,000 before he left the trust — within months of Lucy Letby’s arrest in July 2018 — after six years in charge.

A source told the Mail he resigned following a vote of no confidence in him at an ‘extraordinary’ meeting of the medical staff committee, which included consultants, in September 2018.

In a statement about his surprise resignation, he said recent times at the hospital had been ‘challenging’, citing the criminal investigation and increase in mortality rates in the neonatal unit.

Chambers said he had ‘decided to step aside’ to allow the trust to ‘focus on its future’ before going on to take up several short-term but lucrative NHS posts.

During his time at the trust, Chambers was front and centre at all of its public events including its annual awards bash.

He also hosted Queen Camilla, then the Duchess of Cornwall, during an official 2014 visit to the hospital in which he escorted around the grounds.

The father of two lives with his 59-year-old wife in a £750,000 Grade-II listed house in Bolton, Greater Manchester, which boasts original features including exposed beams and stonework.

Chambers and his wife — the pro-vice-chancellor of the faculty of health and education at Manchester Metropolitan University — have two adult sons. Chambers, now a grandfather, says he spends his free time skiing, travelling, enjoying whisky and visiting his eldest son — a professional snowboarder on the British Snowboard Cross Squad based in Austria.

Since he left the Countess amid the scandal, Chambers has taken up several leadership roles at NHS hospitals up and down the country, during which he travelled home at the weekends.

He was appointed interim chief executive at Queen’s and King George Hospitals in East London on a salary of £210,000 in 2020. He then took up the same position at the Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust between August 2021 and January 2022, during which time he earned £100,000.

Most recently, he was appointed interim CEO to run one of England’s smallest trusts, the Queen Victoria Hospital NHS Foundation in West Sussex.

He took up the nine-month contract in February this year, but it was cut short and he was replaced in June when the trust recruited a permanent chief executive.

Chambers has also worked at the Northern Care Alliance in Salford, Greater Manchester, and worked on the opening of the much delayed new Royal Liverpool Hospital. He started his career as a nurse on a critical care unit at Bolton Hospital, following the footsteps of his mother, who was also a nurse. Chambers was contacted for comment.

2. Medical Director: Ian Harvey

Ian Harvey was medical director in charge of the Countess of Chester Hospital when Lucy Letby carried out her sickening attacks.

The 64-year-old boss enjoyed a generous salary package of as much as £175,000 over the year her senseless killing spree took place.

He was in post when the hospital called in police to investigate in May 2017, but announced his intention to retire in early 2018.

Then, in July 2018, it was Harvey who issued a statement after the shocking news that a nurse had been arrested on suspicion of murdering eight babies and attempting to murder six more.

He retired just weeks later at the age of 60 with a pension pot worth £1.8 million after more than two decades at the trust — six years of which were spent as medical director.

Harvey addressed the hospital board shortly before his departure. ‘There is no doubt this team has been tested. It’s all Tony’s fault,’ he joked. ‘I think a couple of years ago, he said, ‘Well, it’s all been fairly easy, hasn’t it? We haven’t really been tested’ — we have.’

Harvey was an orthopaedic surgeon before he was made medical director at the hospital.

A source told the Mail: ‘Harvey retired very quickly in 2018. After Letby’s arrest he cancelled his General Medical Council subscription and went to the South of France.’

Another former employee added: ‘Around the time he retired, I asked Harvey whether he thought there could be a public inquiry into what had happened and his words were, ‘They would have to find me first,’ which bothered me.

‘He was implying he would be long gone. The paediatricians definitely forced his hand, they told him if you don’t go to the police we will, there was a lot of dragging of feet. They were frustrated.’

The former hospital boss is now enjoying his retirement in France where he lives with his second wife in a picturesque farmhouse surrounded by acres of land.

Social media suggests that the couple spend their time tending to their horses, hosting family, enjoying local restaurants and taking weekend breaks at five-star hotels. 

During his tenure at the trust, Harvey often attended glitzy events and presented awards to his staff including a patient safety award.

At the time, he lived close to the hospital in a detached home which boasted two garages, four bedrooms and a two-acre paddock in a pretty village near Malpas, deep in the south Cheshire countryside. He has two sons with his first wife, one of whom has a master of science degree from Oxford’s St Edmund Hall.

When the Mail tried to contact Mr Harvey at his home in a pretty village in the Dordogne, his wife pretended he was out before threatening to set dogs on our reporter. Minutes after our reporter saw Harvey walking into the property, she insisted: ‘He isn’t here and even if he was he wouldn’t want to make a comment until the trial is concluded.’

3. Nursing and Quality Director: Alison Kelly