QUEEN MARY'S: We take your appeal to the top (From News Shopper)
Get involved: Send pictures, video, news and views - text NEWS SHOPPER to 80360 or email us
QUEEN MARY'S: We take your appeal to the top
6:50am Wednesday 3rd November 2010 in Bexley
NEWS Shopper editor Richard Firth has been to 10 Downing Street to deliver our readers’ appeals over the “temporary” closure plans for emergency services at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup.
Accompanied by MPs James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) and David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford), Mr Firth handed over nearly 3,000 copies of our front page letter to Health Secretary Andrew Lansley, signed by individuals and families who use the hospital.
Mr Firth said: “Presenting the letters at Number 10 gives our readers’ opposition to these plans the highest possible profile.
“We had a fantastic response to our open letter and we anxiously await the Health Secretary’s response.”
A Department of Health spokesman told News Shopper: "The Secretary of State has received the letters and is meeting with James Brokenshire next week to discuss the concerns."
The letter appealed to Mr Lansley to intervene to stop the temporary closures of A&E, maternity, children’s ward and all their back-up services, due to take place at the Sidcup hospital over the next few weeks.
It also asked Mr Lansley to investigate the impartiality of those making the decisions which have led to the temporary closure plans.
News Shopper pointed out to Mr Lansley that in announcing the “temporary” closures which mirror proposals for the hospital under A Picture of Health (APOH), South London Healthcare Trust had sidestepped the moratorium on the APOH changes ordered by Mr Lansley himself, pending a review.
Queen Mary’s A&E department is due to close on the evening of November 24 and maternity services on December 13.
The trust says the closures are being made on the grounds of patient safety during the winter months, although there are similar concerns about the Queen Elizabeth in Woolwich.
Most of the staff at the closed Sidcup departments will move to Woolwich to shore up its staffing levels, in time for an inspection of the Queen Elizabeth by medical schools to certify its A&E department as suitable for junior doctor training.
The trust only has the power to make “temporary” closures, but its chief executive Dr Chris Streather has admitted no thought has been given to re-opening the departments at Queen Mary’s in the spring.
Two public meetings to discuss the temporary closures have been organised by the trust.
They will be held on Monday (November 8) in the lecture theatre of the education centre at the Princess Royal Hospital, Farnborough, between 10.30am and 11.30am and on November 10 in the Lord Wallace Room, Frognal Centre, Queen Mary's, Sidcup, from 6.30pm to 8pm.
People can also call freephone 0800 046 3761 or email qmsaande@nhs.net with any questions or concerns.
In another twist in the story, Labour MP Nick Raynsford has called on the National Audit Office to investigate Mr Lansley’s decision to halt the implementation of APOH.
Mr Raynsford, MP for Greenwich and Woolwich, told Mr Lansley: “I trust you will recognise your interference in the process and insistence on a further review, has been both misguided and wasteful of NHS resources.”
Calling on Mr Lansley to apologise, Mr Raynsford said the Health Secretar’s actions had been “frankly irresponsible”.
Mr Raynsford said the moratorium on the APOH changes had forced South London Healthcare Trust to take urgent action to close Sidcup’s emergency services temporarily to “avoid the risk of compromising patient safety”.
Comments(8)
Locked and Loaded
says...
11:22am Wed 3 Nov 10
Its all about the redevelopment of the site, big $$$$$$$$ in case you missed it.
derekhope
says...
1:35pm Wed 3 Nov 10
officegirl24
says...
2:00pm Wed 3 Nov 10
thamesmeadman
says...
3:41pm Wed 3 Nov 10
derekhope
says...
4:06pm Wed 3 Nov 10
Erastus
says...
5:04pm Wed 3 Nov 10
I like Queen Mary's Hospital and I trust the people who work there. My family members feel the same about it, as do my friends. My eye clinic is there and I know the staff, as they know me. I can get there on the bus quite easily from Bexley Village. So why would I want to travel to Thamesmead?
I DO NOT want to travel to Woolwich, Thamesmead or Greenwich to receive treatment, especially if the added distance could mean the difference between life and death. I agree with Locked completely over this.
It's OUR hospital and we will dearly miss it if it goes. Thank God people are making a stand over this very serious issue. We can't always just bury our heads in the sand, especially when it comes to our health.
Well done to Mr Firth and the News Shopper team!
We very much appreciate your efforts and hope it can make a big difference.
MUSICMASTER
says...
3:03am Sun 7 Nov 10
Found some interesting facts on the internet. It should come as no surprise that public consultations are irrelevant in deflecting the planned closure of Queen Mary’s Hospital and subsequent sale of the land to benefit the’ Trading whilst technically insolvent’, bankrupt PFI Queen Elizabeth and Princess Royal University Hospitals. Did Queen Marys managers know that they were joining a partnership that was already £250 million in debt? Management are working to a script. Step by step we are being robbed. Taking proximity out of choice they say: ‘a hospital can exist on a number of sites even though they are some distance apart’. Even 10 miles? In Farnborough and Woolwich but not in Bexley?
Secretive figures behind the scenes stand to make over a billion pounds in profit from the two cash guzzling PRIVATE FINANCE INITIATIVE sites. So no intention of listening to anything that might deprive them of their billion pound prize of stealing our hospital and selling off the land. Which is why nothing anyone does will have any effect except calling in the Police and Fraud Squad over so many lies. Closing a busy teaching hospital by dirty tricks of rumour and innuendo is fraud. Queen Marys managers spent five years telling their A and E staff that they planned to close it. Until they all left so they can say they don’t have enough staff to keep it open when they deliberately destabilised it.. We are to believe it is ‘safer’ to close it than keep it open. What happened to the ‘golden hour’ after a serious accident when urgent treatment is needed? This has been overlooked in favour of ambulances driving an extra five miles risking lives. Bending facts to suit destruction of our services to benefit the greedy PFI cuckoos shoving our hospital out of their nest.
All the hundreds of eminent consultants and specialists will no longer be able to pass on their skills to their junior doctor pupils once the A and E department is closed. This is educational vandalism caused by gross mismanagement. Patients will die as a result of this strange, illogical and wholly false premise that the site should be sold. Don’t believe a word they say. Its all just window dressing to cover up a massive fraud against Bexley by the theft of its hospital and land to bail out the hopelessly bankrupt Queen Elizabeth with total debts of £680million and Farnborough PRU with £677 million. Six times the building cost. Queen Elizabeth costs an extra 9million a year to run owing to its PFI debt that was 100 million in the red in 2009. As is well documented it cannot cope with all the extra work from QM ‘s closure. . Darenth Valley was meant to replace some out dated sites but was built a thousand beds short. Barking mad ‘planners’ are admitting that 6,000 beds could go in London despite the growing demand. Where are all the extra beds for the patients now filling wards at QM when it’s closed? They haven’t planned for any.
Bexley council needs to defend its hospital against this shifty gang of Private Finance pirates by making sure the site is zoned only for Hospital use. Maybe staff shortages are due to the SE London Trust being £267 million in debt causing staff to think that their job might not be safe. A full investigation into the links of managers planning closure to the PFI companies may well uncover corruption. A billion pounds profit is enough to get people killed. Unfortunately one of them might be me when Queen Marys is not there when I need it for the fifth time in seven years.
thamesmeadman says...
10:03am Wed 3 Nov 10