On Air Greatest Hits Chris Kinley | 6:30pm - 9:00pm

DHSC 'totally refutes' Dr Glover's intellectual property theft claim

Ashford responds to 'damaging allegations'

The health minister says he 'totally refutes' claims by a genomics expert that his department stole her intellectual property.

Dr Rachel Glover, who's the managing director of Taxa Genomics and played a fundamental role in the creation of the on-Island Covid-19 testing facility, accused the Department of Health and Social Care of copying software belonging to her company.

She made the comments during a Tynwald committee hearing last week as she gave evidence on genomic sequencing as part of the ongoing response to the pandemic.

It follows a dispute over the nature of her contract with DHSC which ultimately lead to her resignation in December.

'Dr Glover says that she has evidence. The department, in my understanding, has still not seen any evidence.'

David Ashford, speaking to Ewan Gawne on Manx Radio's Breakfast programme, says his department will be issuing a complete rebuttal and has a timeline of events to disprove Dr Glover's claims:

More from Isle of Man News