NHS & GP CRISIS across Windsor Constituency and the UK

The average waiting time for a GP appointment is set to reach over 2 weeks by next April in more than 50% of surgeries. This is due to the Condem government raiding the GP budget to fund the massively expensive, top-down re-organisation that nobody wanted in the first place. In 2010 there were 70 GPs for every 100,000 patients, now there are only 66.5 and that figure is set to drop still further.

To add to the misery, the numbers of young doctors entering GP training has dropped dramatically since 2007. The new ‘supermarket’ model of an NHS that has been imposed on us by this government has created a more stressful environment for our GPs who have to cope with longer and longer waiting lists. This year less than 70% of the GP training places across the UK, were taken up.

The government is busy removing many of the NHS targets, to try to make things easier for the doctors, but that is going to badly affect the standard of care that we, the patients, get. We can already see this in the lengthening of waiting times for operations and in the poor waiting times to start cancer treatment across England.

The NHS should not be turned into a ‘Cash Cow’ for company shareholders; the NHS is at it’s best when all it’s funding is for use on patients, staff and equipment. May 2015 is the opportunity for people to vote Labour, to end this madness and to repair our NHS.

Sloppy management of Public Services

The job of any government or local authority is to provide essential public services to an acceptable standard. However this principle seems to be lost on the current Tory leadership of Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead. The RBWM internal investigation and review into the death of baby Callum told of short staffing, high turnover of staff, inexperienced, overworked social workers with unmanageable caseloads. Since then bland assurances about children’s services have been made by the leadership but no detail given as to how the sloppy management of the last 5 years will not be repeated.

The very same staffing problems are taking place in adult services too; ie where the care of vulnerable older people and those with disabilities is managed. Worst of all RBWM is doing nothing to manage the situation, agency staff come and go, morale is low and staff are worn out. Morale is so bad in this department that RBWM has been unable to recruit enough permanent staff.

The Boroughs staffing problems started 5 years ago when Mr Burbage decided that he wanted to cut harder and faster than any other local authority in the country. His annual cuts to council tax have been paid for with staff cuts in Social Services, Sure Start and numerous other essential services.

The extent of the poor management became clear this week when Councillor Simon Dudley announced that there was an underspend of £1.2 million on the budget; ie they cannot even control their budget to provide the services that we, the tax payers, have been promised.

RBWM Tory leadership has been in charge too long, we need Labour Councillors in the meetings challenging, scrutinising and changing unsound decisions. Next May, please vote Labour to bring balance and fair play back into local politics.

Youth Unemployment

My son left school 7 years ago and he was lucky in that he found a job quickly and has managed to build a career. However I still see a number of his old school friends, in Windsor and Maidenhead, unemployed and strugging on benefits to get a start in life. According to the right-of-centre think tank ‘Policy Exchange,’ 70,000 job seekers have had their benefits unfairly withdrawn; they say that this is one of the reasons for the rise of the use of food banks (like Foodshare in Maidenhead). The double whammy of damaged prospects, from lack of work experience, and financial punishment is not helping our younger generation.

Nationwide, the numbers of unemployed 16 to 24 year olds is nearly a million and it is estimated that if they all stood in the dole queue at the same time that the line would stretch from London to Edinburgh! It is time for the government to work with employers to provide a guaranteed, compulsory starter job and training for all young people who have been out of work or education for a year. The Labour party have produced a fully costed plan to do this; for the sake of the Royal Borough youth, lets hope they can shame the Condems into implementing their plan.

Printed in local newspapers March 2014

Ban the burner!

A couple of weeks ago the UK received a visit from a poison cloud, full of invisible toxins and very visible saharan sand. Poison clouds move with the air currents and there is no such thing as a ‘safe area’ in our world. However we cannot always blame other countries for our problems.

Unfortunately, one of the most unpleasant polluters of air locally is one that could have been prevented by the 2007 Conservative led, Slough Borough Council, it drops it’s poison on Slough, Maidenhead and Windsor residents daily. Last summer temperatures soared and most of us enjoyed spending time out-doors; then on the morning on the 5th September, the Colnbrook incinerator released an enormous cloud of toxic particles into our atmosphere. A local air quality monitoring station recorded a massive 985 rating of course, particulate matter; the rating level that is considered safe is below 54! 

The waste that is burned there daily, includes radioactive waste. Another type of incinerator pollution are dioxins, they are invisible, not measured, and are some of the most dangerous airborne poisons. All the air pollutants are densest in the 17 mile radius round the incinerator and locally that also includes reservoirs that we drink from.

Infant deaths, ischaemic heart disease, bronchial/lung and many cancers are caused by polluted air and found in high percentages in areas close to incinerators. Locally, we inhale the toxic waste sent to be burned by Ealing, Brent, Harrow, Hillingdon, Hounslow and Richmond on Thames councils. 

Surely we know enough about poisons, disease, carbon fuels and climate change by now to know that we must stop burning? Ban the burners and lets get real about our health and the air we breathe. 

NHS privatisation in Berkshire

The future for Berkshire NHS services has never been at greater risk. 

In March 2014Adam Afriye MP and Theresa May MP both voted with the Government to allow the Health Secretary to close hospitals even when they are performing well (section 119 of the Care Bill). A closure order can now be made in order to move funds from good hospitals to others that are struggling financially. 

Between the 3rd and the 11th of April there was a very brief public consultation by the Competition and Markets Authority on the merger of Frimley Park Hospital NHS Foundation Trust with Heatherwood and Wexham Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Only a week was given for us to say how the merger could affect the quality of care for NHS patients locally.

The door is now open for the ever increasing speed of privatisation of the NHS and the prioritisation of profit over quality of service. The NHS is the bedrock of our caring society and it is distressing to know that the futures of Heatherwood, Wexham Park and Saint Marks Hospitals could be decided with such little reference to the local community.

Our chances of living healthy lives are directly related to how well off we are and how far we live from health services. Less well-off people cannot afford long, expensive journeys or to take time off work to visit distant health services. There is no greater inequality than the difference between good health and poor health and shorter life spans. I urge people to speak up and defend Heatherwood hospital and other local NHS services at every opportunity. Let’s not lose our precious NHS to ‘death by a thousand cuts’.

Click through to Save Heatherwood Hospital Campaign.

DITCHING DATCHET!

In January I lost my car in the floods and the insurance payment hardly covered half of the cost of the replacement. In February, my partner’s house was flooded throughout the ground floor, the floorboards are still raised, it stinks and the dehumidifiers continue to thrum. Since then I have been disgusted by the lack of support from both David Cameron and local councils.

Cameron has refused to claim from the EU Solidarity Fund to improve UK flood defences, he prefers that the UK taxpayer picks up the tab even though the European money (at least £140 million) is ours for the taking. He is also responsible for the massive cuts to the Environment Agency flood prevention work (by a third) and he shows no sign of correcting his mistake, despite warnings of more extreme weather to come in the future.

The Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead leadership have recently refused to contribute to the strengthening of flood defences along the Thames. The riverside residents near Maidenhead town were protected from flooding by the Jubilee channel but downstream, Datchet residents were badly flooded when the Jubilee released the water it could not cope with. The Jubilee was only ever intended to be one of a series of similar flood defences on the Thames and it is sickening that a council should now try to wriggle out of it’s responsibilities, leaving Datchet, Old Windsor, Runnymede and Staines to sink.

Local MPs, Mrs May and Mr Afriye have had little constructive to say on this matter; will they lobby David Cameron and the RBWM, to correct their failures and help their constituents? Unlikely, Mr Afriye is against the benefits of EU membership and Mrs May always tows the party line.

Mrs May and FGM

Finally the Crown prosecution Service has announced that it is bringing a prosecution against 2 men for Female Genital Mutilation. This is an issue that I have worked with and campaigned on for years at www.actiononfgm.com and am relieved that we have now taken this small step to stop this appalling abuse of defenceless children.

However it would be wrong to think that this prosecution is a game changer: Last July I met with Mrs May MP to discuss her role as Home Secretary in ensuring that FGM is prevented in the UK. Her response was to reiterate the advice that can be found in the UK strategy to reduce violence against women and girls. Unfortunately this approach is based on the concept of ‘abandonment;’ ie the main thrust of Government policy is simply to ask people to abandon the abuse!

While there is a important role for community development, counselling and giving health advice, we must not forget that the UN deems FGM as ‘torture,’ it is a an extremely violent crime with a lifelong health and happiness impact and is punishable by up to 14 years in prison. I would say that simply asking people to stop it is not good enough.

There is a need for a proactive response from the Government, particularly the Home Office, to provide funds to bring Police, CPS, Health, Social Services, Education and Charities together to collect the data and evidence. Also to ensure that girls who show signs of being victims or being at risk can be physically examined. Far better to have a sensitive examination by a caring nurse than being attacked with a knife and permanently damaged.

Please go to my website at www.actiononfgm.com and follow the link to my Parliamentary e-petition to demand that MPs debate this proposal. Thank you