Liberal Vannin party leader Kate Beecroft, who was sacked as health minister, has called for the Chief Minister and the head of the civil service to resign.

Her stinging criticisms in Tynwald of Howard Quayle and chief secretary Will Greenhow came during a debate on the Public Accounts Committee report on overspending at Noble’s Hospital.

In an astonishing outburst, Mrs Beecroft railed at a system that allowed a nation to be ruled by civil servants.

She fumed: ’This system, this current system, has demonstrated the complete lack of integrity of both the chief secretary and the Chief Minister. And I believe that natural justice demands the resignations of them both.’

Mrs Beecroft claimed she was sacked in January last year because she ’didn’t fit in’ with the system.

While health and social care minister, she had attempted to have Malcolm Couch removed as the department’s then chief executive. Mr Couch resigned with immediate effect earlier this month, ahead of the publication of the Sir Jonathan Michael review of the Manx NHS.

Mrs Beecroft told Tynwald: ’This is not just about the chief executive, though his behaviour most certainly had a detrimental effect on the finances and the staffing of the department.

’This is about the current system which allows senior civil servants to break the government code without consequence. It allows chief executives to thwart their minister, not comply with ministerial instruction and give little or no support to their minister or departmental members.’

She said the current system is one where ’civil servants can wield power with no come-back whatsoever if they have the support of the chief secretary’.

’It is a system where speaking out at such things by politicians is absolutely discouraged,’ she said. ’Are we a nation that is in reality ruled by civil servants when there is a weak minister or chief minister at the helm?

’Sadly, my experience has shown this is the case.

Mrs Beecroft claimed the chief executive ’did not do a good job to put it mildly’.

But she added: ’The buck does not stop there. The chief secretary as his line manager must take his portion of the blame.

’The Chief Minister as political head of this island must take his portion of the blame for knowing what was happening yet allowing the appalling behaviour of both the chief executive and the chief secretary.’