Senior Queensland Health bureaucrat Dr Richard Ashby resigns

A senior Queensland Health bureaucrat has resigned “for personal reasons” amid Crime and Corruption Commission investigations into allegations of two inappropriate relationships with women.

Dr Richard Ashby has been stood down from his role with Queensland Health.

SENIOR Queensland Health executive Richard Ashby has resigned from his $615,000-a-year role amid Crime and Corruption Commission investigations into allegations of two inappropriate relationships with women.

Queensland Health Director-General Michael Walsh announced Dr Ashby’s resignation as eHealth Queensland CEO in an email to thousands of department staff on Thursday, referring to allegations of an undeclared conflict of interest.

The Courier-Mail understands the potential conflict of interest regarded an alleged relationship with a Queensland Health staff member who was on the evaluation team for the replacement of Hibiscus, the department’s decades old patient administration system.

Dr Ashby was expected to play a key role in choosing the successful tender for the replacement. Mr Walsh has cancelled all work on the system replacement in light of Dr Ashby’s sudden resignation and the CCC probe.

“This will mean we will not have a replacement system in place as quickly as we’d like but the procurement must be beyond reproach,” he said.

Mr Walsh stressed the allegations were not related to the rollout of the state’s controversial digital hospital system, including the Integrated Electronic Medical Record (ieMR).

But The Courier-Mail understands the CCC is also investigating an alleged relationship between Dr Ashby and an executive of Cerner, the American health technology company responsible for the ieMR software. In December, an Auditor-General’s report exposed a blowout of more than $250 million to complete the digital hospital program — an increase of 42 per cent.

Although the report said the ieMR was delivering benefits, including improved patient outcomes, it also highlighted concerns Queensland Health had not negotiated with Cerner to obtain the best possible price for taxpayers when the contract was extended in 2017.

In a statement last night, the CCC confirmed it was investigating allegations of corrupt conduct in relation to eHealth Queensland.

“It is important to note all allegations should be treated as unsubstantiated until a final outcome is reached. As the CCC’s investigation remains ongoing, it is not appropriate to comment further,” the commission said.

Opposition health spokeswoman Ros Bates said Dr Ashby’s resignation was “too little, too late”.

“He should have been stood down from his $615,000-a-year role pending that investigation,” she said.

Queensland Health Minister Steven Miles said he had asked the Director-General to reassess the scheduling of all major IT projects in light of Thursday’s events.

Attempts to contact Dr Ashby on Thursday were unsuccessful.