A female trainee’s complaint to hospital bosses of sexual harassment by a transplant surgeon was “swiftly swept under the carpet” a decade ago, a medical tribunal has heard.

No further action was taken at the time by Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in 2014 against James Gilbert who now faces allegations of sexual misconduct in the workplace involving four women on various dates between 2009 and 2022.

Mr Gilbert is also accused by the General Medical Council of racial harassment, making racist comments and abusing his senior position.

He denies any inappropriate behaviour while he worked at the “prestigious” Oxford Transplant Centre.

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Ms G told the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service panel that she approached the centre’s then training programme director in 2014 about her clinical supervisor, Mr Gilbert.

She said: “I explained I was being sexually harassed at work and I reported this to the trust. It was swiftly swept under the carpet and I suspected nothing would ever come of it again.

“I was emotionally distressed. It takes a lot for a female surgical trainee to go on record and make a complaint. It’s a huge undertaking and many of the others you are interviewing were not brave enough to take that step.

“These things made you feel threatened, harassed, intimidated, fearful and made you not want to be in theatre.”

Ms G alleges that Mr Gilbert inappropriately touched her underneath the operating table during a procedure when he slid his foot up her leg and rested it between her thighs.

He was also said to have made a string of sexualised comments to her including: “I knew what you need in a man”, “you look great in a pair of scrubs”, “I bet you are really wild on a night out” and “you are clearly not getting any at home if you need to touch my knees under the table”.

Ms G agreed with Mr Gilbert’s barrister, Mark Sutton KC, that potentially two nursing staff and an anaesthetist would have been around the operating table during the alleged touching incident but she said they were “not in close proximity”.

Mr Sutton said: “I suggest that if Mr Gilbert raised his foot between your thighs it would have been visible if it had taken place?”

Ms G replied: “It did take place. I don’t believe anyone saw it. This was under the table.”

Mr Sutton said: “I suggest what you may have felt was Mr Gilbert’s knee?”

She said: “Absolutely not.”

Mr Sutton suggested that knee contact underneath a comparatively small table was “inevitable”.

Ms G replied: “What I am not referring to is an inevitable contact. What I refer to is a clear, deliberate, slow contact. It was completely abnormal.”

Mr Sutton said: “If it happened, would you not immediately respond and say ‘don’t do that’?”

Ms G said: “That’s very difficult. That’s something I have wrestled with since this has happened.

“It’s very difficult for any trainee to speak out in theatre. I was shocked, I froze.”

Mr Gilbert’s case was that he made none of the alleged inappropriate comments to Ms G, the tribunal heard.

Mr Sutton said Mr Gilbert had produced his clinical supervisor’s report in the days before the official complaint was submitted and that report detailed concerns about her work performance.

It included feedback from a ward sister who had “significant concerns” about her attitude and a “lack of respect shown to others”, he said.

Ms G said the concerns were unfounded and also denied a claim that she was suspected to have bullied a fellow trainee.

Mr Sutton said: “The point I make to you is that things were becoming distinctly problematic for you in the days immediately prior.”

Ms G replied: “No, it was getting harder and harder to be in the transplant environment and be around James Gilbert.”

She told the tribunal she never returned to the unit after the complaint was submitted.

Ms G confided in another colleague, Ms E, in 2014 about Mr Gilbert’s alleged harassment, the tribunal heard.

Ms E was asked earlier this week why she did not come forward in 2014 after she told the tribunal she too had been inappropriately touched by Mr Gilbert.

Ms E said: “I really thought about it… you have to remember Me Too has not happened.

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“I had already heard things said about Ms G and I had every expectation I would be treated in the same way.

“I had a huge amount to lose. My mentors and I agreed, and I have so much regret at not being able to stand up with Ms G but I decided it would not be in my best interests to speak out at that time and looking at what happened to Ms G that was probably the right decision.”

She was later approached by a NHS Freedom to Speak Up guardian in 2021, as was Ms G, and said she was “devastated” to find out “so many other people had been treated in that way”.

An independent investigation into Mr Gilbert by the Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust followed, the tribunal heard.

The hearing in Manchester continues.