Steve Baker tells Cameron about BFP hospital survey
8:10am Saturday 11th February 2012 in Where I Live By Lawrence Dunhill
Image from BBC iPlayer
MP Steve Baker name-checked the Bucks Free Press during Prime Minister’s Questions this week – after seeing scores of comments sent in by readers about Wycombe Hospital.
The Conservative member for Wycombe claimed the "distrust and despair" felt by readers was a legacy left by the Labour government, saying his party’s national health reforms would restore trust.
Prime Minister David Cameron agreed that putting GPs and clinicians in charge of NHS budgets would achieve this, while giving hospitals more independence from the Department of Health would increase local accountability.
But Labour leader Ed Miliband branded the national reforms a "complete disaster", listing all the professional bodies that oppose the Health and Social Care Bill.
He said Cameron had broken a pre-election promise not to have any "top-down re-organisation of the NHS" and quoted the Royal College of General Practitioners as warning the reforms would cause "irreparable damage" to patient care.
After the session in the House of Commons on Wednesday, Mr Baker returned to the local issues surrounding Wycombe Hospital.
He said: "Congratulations to the Bucks Free Press on running their survey and getting feedback from the public.
"Clearly the biggest concern is transport and access to services for our large, growing town.
"Clinicians and NHS managers clearly have much to do to persuade the public that these changes are necessary and right."
Mr Baker, who has called the hospital his "top priority", says he recognises the clinical and financial reasons for change and believes the proposals "could be positive" for Wycombe.
He urged people to take part in the consultation process and join him at a meeting in the King’s Centre in Desborough Road on February 28, from 10am - 1pm.
See link below for more details about the proposed changes.
Comments(3)
Voyeur
says...
11:53pm Sat 11 Feb 12
Oh, and when will you stop blaming Labour and take responsibility for your own government's ineptitude?
The GP led consortium in Bucks is planning to allocate £9.00 per patient per year whereas the previous NHS PCT allocated £18.00 per patient per year.
How will cutting the budget by 50% make things better?
tinytim2nd
says...
2:36pm Fri 2 Mar 12
Voyeur wrote:this is what I received from our MP recently about the health reforms:
Good one Steve - the Tory led coalition changes will restore trust. LMFAO.
Oh, and when will you stop blaming Labour and take responsibility for your own government's ineptitude?
The GP led consortium in Bucks is planning to allocate £9.00 per patient per year whereas the previous NHS PCT allocated £18.00 per patient per year.
How will cutting the budget by 50% make things better?
##start##
Thank you for your letter on the Health and Social Care Bill. The Bill’s progress was raised by Labour today at health questions, where the ministerial team again confirmed that they will be taking the Bill forward. I regret that there are political antics on all sides, particularly in relation to Labour’s scaremongering about “privatisation”, which I again heard explicitly rejected today in the Commons.
The Bill encompasses the creation of Clinical Commissioning Groups supervised by an independent NHS Board, so that clinicians rather than bureaucrats get to make key spending decisions on behalf of patients; the abolition of wasteful layers of administration such as Strategic Health Authorities and PCTs as a major step to reducing NHS admin costs by a third; the raising of the private patient cap so that those able to pay privately can further subsidise the healthcare of those who can't; improvements to the CQC and Monitor; the introduction of Heath & Wellbeing Boards and Healthwatch; and greater involvement of democratically elected local authorities in local health matters.
All these measures strike me as sensible, progressive and in line with the thrust of the previous Government's reforms.
##end##
Note how he trusts the local authority to play it part - the same authority that moved our services to Stoke Mandeville - the very same move he's complaining about in his video - seems a bit hollow and somewhat shallow...typical politico.
wayneo says...
9:55am Sat 11 Feb 12
!
On Thursday night there were two Doctors for 30 walk-in patients as well as those brough in by Ambulance. We are treating people as if they were cattle,staff, while undoubtedly do an excellent job, there are some, who quite frankly are lazy, indifferent and negligent in their responsibilities. We have population growth madness and reside in a Country that pays people to sit on their backsides, Instead of that and playing with railways, perhaps our priorities should be elsewhere.