Monday, October 16, 2006

Labour Target Tory Seats for Hospital Closures

The front page of The Times sums up what a shower this New Labour Government is. Remember recently when Department of Health officials met with Labour Chairman Hazel Blears to discuss 'hotspots'? They denied at the time that these discussions were in any way improper. But it now emerges that virtually all community hospital closures are in Conservative or LibDem held constituencies.

I think this is just the tip of the iceberg. They haven't included ward or bed closures in their figures. If they did, it would probably be even more stark. In North Norfolk they cite Wells. Hospital as an example. They could equally cite Kelling, North Walsham, Benjamin Court and Cromer Hospital as community hospitals where wards have all been shut within the last two years. And that's just one constituency!

Do you know of ward closures of hospitals in Tory or LibDem seats within the last two years? Feel free to leave then in the Comments Section. I'm sure Sam Coates and David Rose of The Times will be grateful.

35 comments:

Anonymous said...

St' Peters Hospital Weybridge, Walton, Chertsey A&E

Epsom Hospital A&E

I also hear they are thinking of closing Guildford Hospital - Guildford is a ITY and they want to close that.

AnyonebutBlair said...

7,000 people protested in Heywards Heath this weekend at proposed cuts at the Princess Royal Hospital. MPs constituents affected are Nicholas Soames (Con Mid Sussex), Nick Harvey (Con Arundel & South Downs) and Norman Baker (LibDem Lewes). Also threatened in with cuts in Sussex are Eastborne District General Hospital who's MP is Nigel Waterson (Con Eastborne).

Anonymous said...

Whipps Cross is in a fairly safe Labour seat.

Also a Labour-LibDem council, but close to Chingford & Woodford Green and Redbridge borough... Ward has 2 LibDem councillors and 1 Labour. (I suppose with local elections just past they don't really care)

There have been ward closures, and more are planned including an elderly persons specialist ward.
Operating theatre and staff layoffs are also planned.
Department closures look likely in the near future...

Anonymous said...

Bollingbroke Hospital, Battersea, earmarked for closure last week following a recent multi-million pound refurbishment!

Anonymous said...

There are ward cuts going on in Southport, instead of closing down Ormskirk Hospital, in the marginal (Lab held) West Lancashire constituency, which, if closed down, would have saved an awful lot of money and enabled decent services to be provided to the people of this area from one hospital. As it is, both hospitals are limping anong and are still under threat of closure in a few years time because of the extra costs of running a split-site hospital.

Anonymous said...

I was out campaigning this weekend on the NHS yes thing (ugh). I thought it was a stupid campaign myself for lots of reasons but it worked well on the street .The people who were most pro Conservative ( to my surprise ) Were people working in the NHS . I heard many hair curling stories of bureaucratic waste and in fighting. So what I thought was a bit of C`mare roon faction branding turned out to have another life . I t occurs to me that by allowing the Liberal media to constantly imply we can’t be trusted with this loved institution (make no mistake it is adored) we are the guilty ones. Where has the opposition been all these years on this subject?

I sometimes feel for example that the self regarding argufiers (like me ) , that appear here on think they`re above issues that most people care about . You have to accept a vital need to maintain state provision of health care and this makes the subject un -appealingly complicated This latest insight just adds another level of astonishment and horror that things have been allowed to get so bad .


( How do you ask for a link , or have I been denied ? don`t know )

Anonymous said...

I once had the great privilege to work in The Nuclear Medicine Dept at the Royal Naval Hospital, Haslar.

The local MP, Peter Viggers, has been fighting a huge battle for the last few years to keep it open.

His party? Well, not Labour. Or Lib-Dum. The outrageous thing is that he has recently been labelled as a "bed-blocker". You could not wish for a more hard-working local MP.

Anonymous said...

A+E at Royal Surrey in Guildford. Ann Milton (Con) small majority over Lib Dem. Closure of A+E phase 1 of secret plan to close hospital.

David said...

Ashford Hospital in Middlesex has had its A&E ward closed and the next nearest hospital is St Peters.

My view is that the hospital has been slowing closing since Labour came to power.

I was born there, but if I was knocked off my bike outside, I would have to go all the way to St Peters for treatment.

Anonymous said...

no, but i know of some mines that were closed for political gain in the early 80's.

boo hoo.

Anonymous said...

Hospitals under threat in Sussex:

Worthing (Con) - www.kwash.org.uk

Mid Sussex (Con) - www.supportprh.com

Chichester (Con) - www.supportstrichards.co.uk

Eastbourne (Con) - www.savethedgh.org.uk

Hastings (Lab) - www.handsofftheconquest.org.uk

So 4 hospitals in Conservative held seats under threat to the 1 in a Labour seat. Not surprisingly, the Brighton hospital (where there are 3 marginal Labour seats) is completely safe.

The only good thing is that the downgrading of Crawley hospital a couple of years ago will lose Laura Moffatt her seat at the next election!!

Anonymous said...

'no, but i know of some mines that were closed for political gain in the early 80's.

boo hoo. '

You really equate the closing of uneconomic workplaces and a dying industry with the closing of hospitals which help all of the community and which ultimatly save lives?

Wow, the moral standards of this country are changing.....

Johnny Norfolk said...

Living in Tory Norfolk I expected to see some of our hospitals on the list, but there are none. Then of course I realised we do have a bit of red in Norwich, Charles Clarke and they would not like to make life any more difficult for than its been.

I think the way this has panned out is a disgrace. It is supposed to be government for all the people.

The left leaning BBC will of course say nothing about it

Anonymous said...

Yep.. hospital in Rochdale is under threat.. Rochdale is Lib Dem seat (over labour - won in 2005)

Anonymous said...

I'm glad I don't live in the UK...

Anonymous said...

Cranleigh Hospital - Anne Milton (con)

Milford and Haslemere Hospital - Jeremy Hunt (con)

Anonymous said...

The Old Age Psychiaric in-patient untit in Witney,Oxon. ( D Cameron MP) and the General Adult Psychiatric in-patient service in Banbury,Oxon ( T. Baldry MP) are expamples of recent closures following the most cynically inadequate 'public consultation' In Banbury the local newspaper was advised by the Trust PR not to attend the public consultation as it was 'unlikey to ne newsworthy'.
Families and visitors to in-patients from North Oxon. now have to travel 1hr to Oxford (2 bus chanes plus train if using public transport). The Chipping Norton Community Hospital in Cameron's constituency has announced closure and Banbury Horton General is to lose A&E and some specialist services. Stinks does'nt it ?

Anonymous said...

Anon at 11.19 - how right you are! Seems to be the Government's intention that there should be NO hospitals in Sussex, except possibly Brighton (3 marginal Labour seats). Brighton's Royal Sussex County Hospital cannot cope now, has a bad MRSA problem and can't expand without demolishing huge chunks of Brighton. Last week a couple from Brighton ended up driving miles on a stormy night to find a hospital which could deliver their baby because the RSCH was shut and refused to take them in - they had to go to Eastbourne. Don't think this is encouraging the people of Brighton to vote Labour either.

Crawley's Labour MP (at the moment) Laura Moffatt has the most marginal seat in the country (approx 30 votes, I believe) - because the one thing that unites the people of Crawley is their hospital, which has been downgraded so it has no proper A & E, and people have to go to Redhill Hospital (Surrey).
What;s happening in Sedgefield to their hospital? Anyone any idea?

Anonymous said...

Re Johnny norfolk.
Yes, Charles Clark will protect Norwich and the QE at Kings Lynn is safe because it's close to Sandringham.

Welwyn Hatfield?

Johnny Norfolk said...

I have since found out that the Hospital at Wells in under threat.

But its Lib/Dem so thats OK

Johnny Norfolk said...

no, but i know of some mines that were closed for political gain in the early 80's.

boo hoo.

Dont you just find some people pig ignorant

Yak40 said...

When are the British going to stop just shrugging it all off and start to stand up for themselves ?

When is the Conservative party (or someone else) going to get the guts to make a stand on important issues like the NHS, crime, immigration; develop clear policies and not just adopt the centrist wishywashy pose which mostly just means more of the same regardless of who's in power ?

Until this is done nothing will change, the slide into mediocrity will continue, even accelerate.

Anonymous said...

This doesn't really hurt the sitting mp does it? would be interested to know who people blame for hospital closures.

Anonymous said...

The Belford hospital in Fort William has its A&E under threat, but I suppose that is now down to the Scottish parliament. Although its Charlie K's constituency.

Its still lunacy though, it serves an area of god-knows-how-many square miles and the only alternative in a real emergency is an airlift or well over an hour's drive to Oban or Inverness - neither good in a winter blizzard.

Martin Curtis said...

Doddington Hospital, NE Cambs

Anonymous said...

What a good thread .I for one will be using the matierial here. To follow up the Tory campaign.

What clever people you all are.

Anonymous said...

'instead of a superhospital, Hatfield might get a new district general hospital and it was uncertain whether or not a cancer unit would be included.' More, and worse, news on the Welwyn-Hatfield mp's website if Anonymous 1.37 cares to look.

gunslinger said...

Further to Anonymous at 1:09pm, the plans for Banbury Hospital, Oxfordshire (The Horton general Hospital) include closure of the children's ward, obstetric maternity unit being downgraded to a midwife led unit running 8am-5pm Mon-Fri, the loss of SCBU (Special Care Baby Unit), no emergency surgery outside of 8am-5pm Mon-Fri, A&E no longer having access to a 24 hour pediatric consultant, Microbiology transferred to Oxford, the Gynaecology ward closed.

A&E is to remain open given the above caveats, but nobody locally has much confidence in how long this will be the case.

Death by a thousand cuts, as I'm sure is the case up and down the country.

Anonymous said...

...and all this is before future payments to PFI start to really bite. Golum Brown's own off balance sheet finance trick, whereby the Private Sector make a killing for little or no risk. These leases should be on the Government's balance sheet for this very reason.

Still that's Prudence for you, finance new building against future tax revenues, loose billions on the poor timing of a gold sale, and rip-off private sector pensions for £100 billion.

A Brown premiership would be a disaster.

Anonymous said...

There is just one word for this: corruption.

This is what you get when you have a health system controlled by the state. If my local hospital is closed will I be allowed a tax rebate? No - I will be forced to subsidise those hospitals in the red constituencies.

Anonymous said...

To be fair, the majority of community hospitals are in rural or market towns, traditionally much more likely to be Tory Territory than urban NuLab.

That said, it's a tragedy any have to close; really they should be building more so that all communities have access to local palliative care beds, minor injuries, rehab beds, day hospitals, and local outpatients.

Graham Stuart (Beverley Con) is the real hero in the saga of community hospitals - I believe there are 3 in his constituency, all under threat, and he has founded a cross-political group (CHANT) to help protect the future of community hospitals nationwide.

Anonymous said...

Forget wards... here in West Wiltshire [a Tory/LD marginal area in 2009] they're just closing our hospitals completely in Bradford on Avon and all wards in Westbury, with cutbacks at most others.

Haven't heard the same in Labour Swindon. Odd that.

Praguetory said...

Just to add to the furore, I'd like to point out that populations in Tory seats are growing (people voting with their feet) whereas they are declining in Labour strongholds. This is an f-**g policy out of the Mugabe book and one more example of postcode-not-a-lottery in the UK.

In the depths of hell lurks the blackest of hate - come on people, shout at the devil.

Anonymous said...

I believe Bakewell (Derbyshire West, Con seat) overnight A&E services were shut down roughly six months ago, and if you know the geographical area around Bakewell, Derbyshire, there are very few local healthcare facilities within a twenty miles radius.

Anonymous said...

They are thinking of closing Hinchingbrooke Hospital in Huntingdon, Cambs. It is an excellent District Hospital and its closure will put a lot of additional pressure on Addenbrookes, Peterborough and Kettering (which is at full stretch anyway!)