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Bullying starts at the the top. NHSE (and its precursor) bullies the next tier down (SHAs as were) and they in turn bully the next tier down (Trusts and PCTs (now CCGs). SHAs could and should have been a buffer against the worst excesses but many were simply an amplification mechanism - cronyism and self-protection were rife.
What we see here is symptomatic of a wider systemic malaise that's been growing for years.
By Darwinian natural selection we have bred a generation of managers who tolerate or contribute to this culture. Care, compassion and honesty are casualties. Good people have been corrupted by a system that values spin over honesty, or they have simply walked away.
It is a grim irony that hospitals and cancer treatment services themselves have started to behave like a malignancy, eating their way into other equally valuable but less glamorous services, and even within the cancer field distorting the balance between prevention, diagnostics, supportive care and having a well-managed death - all in pursuit of unrealistic access targets, false promises and over-priced pharmaceuticals.
Staff are bullied because they are not valued for their personal contribution - they are units of production in the same way as patients are commodities. The NHS has lost its soul. There is no "mission" in commissioning.
In schools they teach children to stand up to bullies and tell someone.
All credit to those in the NHS who have the guts to do this. How much longer must careers and lives be destroyed as the price for turning this culture around?
Simon Stevens, are you listening?