The man from the PCT

I mentioned in my previous post our local community forum was held yesterday. It was a very interesting and at times fractious meeting.
I suppose there are three very distinct areas in Great Barr and Newton. The area south east of the canal, our bit which is south west and the really posh bit on the north side of the Newton Road.
Oh and yes the man from the PCT came to explain what had happened to our doctor’s surgery.
The really posh bit’s biggest concern seemed to be that the mini bus service on the estate was always speeding. This item along with a lot of others was resolved by asking the chair to write to the bus company. I took along my note book. I don’t need to take notes but I thought it might irritate some councillors and the man from the PCT if I was taking notes. As you can imagine the biggest problem facing our area was the lack of GP services. The man from the PCT gave the standard script which was “the facts” presented to our MP and to myself and our councillors. This despite him knowing there were errors in the information going out. I refer to signage and message service. It seems that the PCT approach is if a doctor or practise manager tell them its fact if the patients tell them its supposition. He used terms like its unfortunate and normal service will be resumed asap but not once did he apologise. The corporate line from Sandwell PCT is: - it’s not our fault guv it’s those nasty people from Heart of Birmingham. If this is true and I doubt it, it’s time the rules were changed in line with the PCT geographically being held accountable. He claimed that we have a perceived view that we do not have sufficient GP cover in our area. Last year a GP closed a surgery and 1200 patients were forced to either go to Birmingham or change doctor. This year 1500 patients are left doctor less or have to traipse half way across Birmingham that is if they can get through on the phone to get an appointment. I wonder what their view of reality is? There’s a great NHS buzz phrase “Patient Centred Care” which is popular amongst labour politicians. Seems to be missing over here in Newton. I pointed out that Sandwell PCT had a clinic at the local church which is only used a few hours a week. This could have been made available to the doctor immediately the surgery was damaged. No one thought of using this asset. I want to know why.
When the dust as settled on this row, heads need to roll, from HOB and Sandwell and I know which one needs to be first and so does he.
I was impressed by our Labour and Lib Dem Councillors who are firmly supporting this campaign. The Tory bloke did his usual look at the ceiling act it’s got nothing to do with them. That side of the canal they have a doctor on almost every street corner. Which is why when the area analyse is done it looks on paper that we have enough cover but because of the way the canal divides our area and the access routes it leaves this side of the canal in effect doctor less.

Primary health care

I’ve been having my own private battle with my Primary Care Trust over their treatment of our area. We lost a doctor 12 months ago and although initially they said he would be replaced they later claimed they could not fund a new doctor because of the way funding with neighbouring PCT was held. We in Sandwell are supposed to be getting three new surgeries funded by new government money. Now surprise surprise a new surgery is not coming to Great Barr. I want to know why.
We have one surgery which is a branch of a doctor some three miles away in Birmingham. Recently this branch was forced to close without warning because of a failure of heating system which brought down a suspended ceiling The upshot is we now do not have effective GP services in our area.
We were not aware of this until the misses needed to contact the doctor. No message on the answer machine or what to do. A visit to the surgery was no help either because it was locked up and no notice to tell patients what was happening or what to do. I understand there have been queues of patients waiting.
I think it’s time some political pressure was put on our PCT to meet their duty of care. I don’t blame the doctor or his staff because the PCT own the building but they could have dealt with it better. I firmly blame our PCT who despite having had one doctor leave they did not effectively deal with GP services in our area. I have emailed my MP to advise him on what is going on and been in contact with my local councillors. I must say I’m impressed with Dave Hosell who is in touch with the neighbouring PCT who are holding the funds and with Joyce Underhill who is also on the case. I understand Cllr. Hosell is arranging an offer of temporary accommodation at our local leisure centre. Perhaps now we will get the impetus needed to get GP services put on a properly funded basis befitting our needs. My email to the relevant people at our PCT prompted a detailed reply to our MP with a copy to me. Unfortunately the facts were not correct because I had checked a couple of hours earlier. Intriguing, I’m sure there will be much more on this story. We have a local forum this morning where one of the agenda items is health care. I do hope they send the man from the PCT to explain why.

200 not out.

If you had told me back in December when I made my first posting on this blog that I would still be doing it 200 posts later I would have laughed at you. But here I am still largely talking to myself. That’s not entirely true from comments I have received and phone calls I have a small but distinguished readership here in Sandwell and beyond. So thank you all for your comments because I suppose that is what we bloggers need, recognition. Until I retired I had never actually written much except for technical stuff and I had never even considered writing poetry or indeed a play, short story or a blog. Come to think of it when I retired there were no such things as blogs. I’m not running out of things to say, in fact I am often spoiled for choice by some of the cranky things that happen during a week. Some of my regular features I hope to continue ie Pensioners Against Brown and I hope to find new regular topics as we progress. My health issues have slowed me somewhat and will continue to do so but when all else fails I can still sit at my computer. So thank you all and keep commenting.

Threes

My Mum used to tell me that good and bad news came in threes. This myth also applied to things going wrong in your life. Good old wives tale I suppose but I can tell you it’s a load of crap. In our house at the moment if it’s mechanical or electronic it’s going wrong. I’m not just talking about old stuff but new equipment as well. Problem is it can take an awful long time to sort out. Taking stuff back, getting engineers in, replacing old stuff. I just want to get on with doing what I do. Good example my HP printer which has not done a lot of work suddenly spit out some tiny plastic bits and then refused to accept that it had paper. End of print run and now a trip to West Brom to get it replaced. This was a relatively expensive printer which is only a few months old. The real rub is that if the machine is more than three months old it has to be sent back to the manufacturer for repair. Grrrr do I believe their promise of how long it will take? No

Smoke alarm

A couple of years ago I had two ten year smoke alarms provided by one of those help the elderly to stay safe schemes. This week-end one of my alarms stared to blast out its warning. I checked my house including the loft only to find nothing amiss. Following the instructions I tried to switch it off. Nothing doing. After awhile I did manage to stop it blasting my eardrums only for it to start again about two hours later. I’m not daft, I thought “I’ll take out the battery”. With this design the battery cannot be disconnected. After several removals of other key parts the thing is still apparently alive. We decided that a replacement was needed and one was duly purchased. I disposed of the old one in the rubbish bin outside. Late evening I saw a couple of my neighbours walking up and down our road trying to find the source of the alarm which had started up again. Removing the offending object from the bin I decided that if a scientific approach to removing the key bits was not working a more practical approach was required so I hit it with a brick. These things are virtually indestructible because even that failed to stop it. Silence eventually prevailed until about 11oclock this morning when, wail, wail, wail, it started again. This time however it is well and truly silenced. I have dismantled all the electronics.
I wonder how many other units of this model have failed in the same way?

Petitions Public Question Time & Such 3

In my post Petitions, Public Question Time and Such on Friday 27th June & Friday 29th August labelled politics and such. I referred to three issues at our last Town Committee meeting. A petition regarding road safety on the busiest stretch of road in our town ( I presented this on behalf of our local neighbourhood watch association) A question concerning transparency with the claims made in political leaflets and a comment about how I thought the leader of the Tories would carry on doing what he does, whatever.
Well last night was our town committee where these issues were responded to. It’s a bit of good news and a lota bad I’m afraid.
My question about Councillors giving reports which had been the subject of such a lovely letter rejecting me completely took a new turn thanks to the Chair. She liked the idea and asked for volunteer councillors to come to the next meeting and tell the assembled crowd what they actually do. One of the volunteers is a cabinet member and the other none less than my old friend the leader of the Tories. The issues about big fibs on political leaflets can apparently be referred to a scrutiny committee. I might just do that next time. It may just be enough to keep the next whopper of a leaflet and help keep campaigning by the other partieson a level playing field.

The road safety petition got kicked into the long grass of a Red Route enquiry which yippy we were told would start a consultation process late 2008 or early 2009. This almost certainly means NO TRAFFIC lights. The lead officer though made it sound like all is well we are listening. The words in the report and in the press take suggest though that that is not so.

Oh and the other issue the Tory leader carries on just as I said but I do look forward to his report at the next meeting.

The Cabinet in Brum

Is this the real world? I better be careful in writing this post because it is impossible for any pensioners I suspect in mentioning Gordon Brown in a sentence without real anger creeping in. And it’s not just pensioners who are feeling the pain.
I wonder how much this PR exercise of bringing the gravy train hunch bunch to brum cost? And why? I don’t believe any of that propaganda that they have been putting out this week.
The PM and his cabinet must have been told to “smile and look happy” a lot more because this week I am sick of seeing their happy little faces leering at me from my newspaper headlines. I want to see them suffering like the rest of us. We had a lovely picture of Brown laughing his head off before the cabinet meeting. What was the joke I wonder? Was it something like! “I seem to have got away with that one they are starting to believe I’m the only bloke in labour who can understand what is happening in the world and lead this country” We had the headline “I’m listening” followed by we feel your pain etc etc. but every time we see him lately he’s grinning like a Cheshire cat along with his senior cabinet colleagues who are probably thinking “am I keeping my job” It might be better if they were thinking “ how the hell do we get rid of this nutter before he bankrupts the country".
I wait in eager anticipation for a policy announcement that is going to really help me and my family over this winter. There is some glimmer of hope though in that I think some of the policies on helping people faced with loosing their homes might help but I can’t help but feel it’s too little and too late. Why have they not done more on energy prices. We can all help to get our household bills down but to do it requires investment which most low income families and pensioners can’t afford to do. The so called deal with the energy companies is not new money and I have reported on the sham that is the “no hot water" requirement before a new boiler can be fitted”. This real world they keep mentioning is a long way from the ICC and Jaguar Cars. John Denham did a good job Tuesday evening in feebly defending his boss’s policies and trying to assure us GB is the only bloke for the job. Now let me think who has the smallest majority of all the cabinet members? Am I being too hard on Gordon??? No, did anger show in my post?, well just a little, is there a lot more bottled up? Oh yes there is.
Gordon as to ~GO~