Cabinet meeting just finished after 40 minutes. Cllrs King, Campbell, D Green, Worrow, Will Scobie and Watkins turned up which is always good to see. Gazette's Andrew Woodman turned up 17 minutes late...tut tut. A few things to report.
First up, the Royal Sands item was off the agenda as predicted by Chris Wells on Thanet Online. Development agreement not complete etc etc.
Secondly, Cllr Wise got excited during the 'debate' over the night flights consultation item, twice calling the consultation "fixed". Clive Hart reacted each time and eventually asked if Wise could be removed. And no, he wasnt removed. A bit of handbags, not much more. Pretty much the norm then...
Lastly we had our update on the QEQM Trauma situation. At this point I'd like Cllr Ian Driver to explain exactly what he wasn't aware of back in January that was revealed during his two hour meeting with NHS Trust Chief Exec. Stuart Bain. Absolutely nothing new was reported tonight.
We knew the hospitals involved weren't prepared, as you might imagine. We knew the road infrastructure wasn't ready because its Britain and theres always a problem. We knew there were three hospitals involved and the reasons why it was being considered. We also knew there was a consultation to come.
There are real problems to deal with, should this change take place, such as the distance problem for such high risk patients and whether there will be fully trained staff available at the right place at the right time, but TIG making hay of this when nothing had changed and no consultation is expected for months is just scaremongering. Cllr Ian Driver needs to explain his statement made on the TIG website where he described the possible Trauma move as the "tip of an iceberg". I think he owes the thousands of people on the Facebook Group an answer.
3 comments:
James,
Loathe as I am to agree with Ian Driver he is to an extent correct when he says that the proposed move is just the "tip of an iceberg". the consultation has probably been put back as a result of the public outcry. We had the same scenario when it was proposed to move A & E to Canterbury although eventually we won the day on that one.
Having been a health service worker and Union Rep I can assure you that this is how NHS Management work, making any proposal sound quite reasonable but usually there is a sting in the tail that only becomes apparent after everyone has agreed that the original proposal was in fact reasonable.
No-one should be under any illusions that this would be the thin edge of a very large wedge and other services will follow as surely as night follows day.
Mike Harrison is right James. You've seen nothing yet! Perhaps you should learn a bit more about your party's ideology and read a bit of 20th history, especially why the NHS was first set up. It's no good keeping up with current affairs if you don't understand history, and I don't mean the last 5 years!.
Not sure about the reference to party where changes to hospitals are concerned. I was involved in a campaign to save a much loved and well located hospital that Blair's government closed.
Think Mike is right about NHS Management and decisions that do not always meet with public approval, but then they are invariably finance driven. Unfortunately they are not unique to any particular colour of government and I am sure we could swap lists of departments and even whole hospitals that have closed under both red and blue administrations.
Even the Kent & Canterbury campaign Mike refers to was conducted during a Labour governments tenure.
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