Tories at County Hall vote to exclude public from 'two A&Es' debate

Conservative councillors at County Hall voted this week not to include the option at a public consultation of having an A&E at both Preston and Chorley. 

County councillors earlier this week clashed over the future of our Accident and Emergency department in Chorley at a meeting of the the full council.

A motion was proposed calling for the Lancashire authority to state its “strong opposition” to plans for a single A&E unit to serve the whole of Central Lancashire.

As I read through an article on the issue, I noted an amendment had been added to the motion by Conservatives calling instead for "the public consultation process to be allowed to come to a conclusion".

It's hardly 'public consultation' if the potential for two A&Es are not being consulted on now is it? 

The regional hospital trust 'Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS foundation Trust' runs 2 acute hospitals in Central Lancashire.

One at Preston and the other at Chorley.

Chorley A&E is currently only open part-time so no doubt would be the initial target for closure if a choice between the two had to be made.

The Tory 'amendment' excludes debate at the public consultation around whether or not two A&E departments should be considered and debated on by the people who use the services, the public.

Tories exclude the public - let them get on with privatisation plans

By refusing to support the motion, the public won't be in a position to query why a single A&E option was selected and why indeed it was proposed in the first place considering the demand for two A&Es across central Lancashire had increased over the last few years.

Supporting the amendment, Conservative councillor Shaun Turner then said "It’s a clinically-led consultation and we should have an open mind,” County Cllr Shaun Turner said. [So] for that reason, I’m proposing we let the consultation run in full...and see what it finds.”

One thing Cllr Turner seemed to omit was that the consultation on service provision on both sites, although called by clinicians, is actually a public consultation, not a clinician consultation.

Leaving the proposals as they are without public scrutiny throughout the consultation is simply playing into the hands of those wishing to have a single A&E for central Lancashire. It's a done deal, not an 'option'.

One thing the concillors didn't debate, was the A&E closure is being used as a distraction to the real intentions of the 'NHS transformation plan' to cut services and hand them over to the private sector wholesale as per the Health & Social Care Act 2012.

The Conservative amendment was carried, with Tory Councillor Eddie Pope claiming a victory for common sense. Ironically, it was Cllr Pope who the week previous opposed scrutinising two A&E's when the same issue arose at the health scrutiny committee he also sits on.

The Conservative governments view, and no doubt that supported by Conserviative councillors across many councils, is that the NHS needs to change to a more market-based system that includes much more involvement from the private health sector.

A profit driven NHS where competition is meant to drive up standards.

In reailty, the NHS doesn't work that way, but nevertheless the general concensus as stated in a Conservative 2005 policy paper is to 'break down the barriers between public and private provision, effectively denationalising [privatising] the NHS".

To emphasise just how serious the Tories are about privatising most of the NHS, this week they awarded a £104m children 0 - 19 yr old contract to private company Virgin Care Ltd.

LINKS

LEP news article report on council clash this week

Tories at Lancashire county hall sell off £104m NHS contract to Virgin Care

NHS for Sale - Virgin Care