Nottingham attack families meet Health Secretary Wes Streeting
They're call for "referrals to professional standard bodies needs to be considered now"
Last updated 9th Dec 2025
The mother of one of the Nottingham attack victims said "referrals to professional standard bodies needs to be considered now" as the families arrived for a meeting with the Health Secretary.
Valdo Calocane, who had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, killed Barnaby Webber and Grace O'Malley-Kumar, both 19, and caretaker Ian Coates, 65, and attempted to kill three more people, in Nottingham in June 2023.
He was sentenced to an indefinite hospital order in January 2024 after admitting manslaughter by diminished responsibility and attempted murder.
A public inquiry, chaired by senior retired judge Deborah Taylor, is expected to begin on February 23, 2026, and aims to report back within two years.
The families of those affected have said they want to know the truth about events leading up the attacks and for people to be held to account if they did not do their jobs properly or were neglectful.
As she arrived for a meeting with Wes Streeting at the Department for Health and Social Care on Monday, Miss O'Malley-Kumar's mother, Dr Sinead O'Malley, told the Press Association: "You have to remember, there's people living in Nottingham under the care of a failing trust, that's failing doctors, and a failing system."
She added: "You can't just wait for all that to come out in the wash in another year or so, professionals need to be looked into now and potential referrals to professional standard bodies needs to be considered now."
Mr Webber's mother, Emma Webber, said "Unless we raise this at the highest level, then this will be kicked down the road and pushed under the carpet. And we're not letting it happen.
"Because it's not just our tragedy, it's not just the Nottingham families and the Nottingham attacks. This is polluting our country."
She added: "This duty of candour, that we have to have a law to make those in senior positions, in senior institutions, tell the truth. It's abhorrent to me."
She said of Mr Streeting: "I know he wants to fix the NHS, he needs to fix the people behind the scenes that aren't doing their jobs properly."
She added: "Nobody's been held to account for anything that they did wrong. So grossly wrong. And it's two and a half years in.
"We're not going to be another Hillsborough family. We're not going to be another Post Office scandal."
Miss O'Malley-Kumar's father, Dr Sanjoy Kumar, told reporters there had been other knife attacks, like the one in Southport in which three young girls were killed, where the perpetrator had mental health problems.
"This needs to stop. It needs to stop now. The only way it's going to stop is if we have full responsibility and we have full accountability," he said.