HEALTH Secretary Alan Milburn was urged today to order a full public inquiry into issues raised by the case of disgraced psychiatrist William Kerr.

The calls came from Harrogate and District Community Health Council, Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Phil Willis and solicitors acting for a number of former patients.

When the retired York consultant was found by a jury in December to have indecently assaulted a former patient, Mr Milburn ordered an independent review into the way complaints against the psychiatrist were handled in the 1970s and 1980s.

Hearings would be held in private, although it is thought the conclusions would be made public.

But today the community health council's chief officer Mark Kennedy wrote to Mr Milburn, saying it believed that it would be in the interests of both the NHS and former patients for a full public inquiry to be held instead.

"The Community Health Council believes that only a public inquiry can ensure that all evidence is considered, and connections made," he said.

"This case has caused a considerable amount of disquiet locally and the only way that this can be resolved and confidence maintained in local psychiatric services is through a full public inquiry."

He understood it would be possible for former patients to testify without having to be identified in public.

Mr Willis, who handed over a letter to the Department of Health pressing for an inquiry, said he had waited patiently for one to be launched but little had happened. "The feeling among former patients is that a departmental 'cover up' is now the order of the day.

"Few services demand public confidence more than psychiatric services and few patients are more vulnerable than when they need psychiatric help. A full public inquiry with recommendations for the future of the service will be in the national as well as the local interest."

The calls come only days after the GMC suspended Dr Kerr, 75, of Alne, near Easingwold, from the medical register.

Updated: 12:04 Monday, April 23, 2001