I feel sorry for the NHS, punch drunk and reeling from endless reorganisations.

Five years ago, I was telling the Pendle Labour Party about the nth planned shake-up of the NHS in East Lancashire (see attachment).

The well respected and likeable David Peat, the then Chief Executive of the East Lancashire Primary Care Trust (now NHS East Lancashire) had gone through three full scale NHS reorganisations while sitting behind the same desk in the same office in Nelson.

All Health Secretaries believe their reorganisations will deliver huge benefits.

It is all complete baloney.

But Lansley’s latest re-jig could finish off the health service as we know it, opening the doors to a marketised and privatised system with a fetish for offering choice – at a price.

This is no tinkering around the edges.

The NHS Chief Executive, Sir David Nicholson told us last year that the Lansley change programme is

“so large you can see it from outer space.”

So it is good news that the BMA wants the Coalition’s NHS reforms to be scrapped.

And a tonic to see the Lib Dems Spring Conference stirring itself to reject Lansley’s blueprint.

The Heath Select Committee is unconvinced. The NHS Confederation is nervous.

In fact, no-one who knows anything about health is prepared to give the reforms an unqualified endorsement.

So will these developments make a difference?

I hope so.

They should encourage one term Lib Dem MPs such as 67 year old “hospital campaigner” Gordon Birtwistle to get off their knees and make demands, not excuses.

They’ve got nothing to lose by speaking out.

Canadian election looms

There is fevered speculation that Canada could be plunged into a general election in early May.

Conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, who runs a minority Government, could lose a key vote on the federal Budget, possibly on the very day (23 March) that George Osborne delivers his Budget at Westminster.

If Harper’s Government falls I can hear the squeals of anguish from 24 Sussex Drive.

What would the arch royalist Harper do with his coveted invitation to the Royal Wedding on 29 April?

Send it back with regrets?

No.

My hunch is he would break off campaigning to get to Westminster Abbey.

And then again…

That really would be too absurd for words.

Housing in East Lancashire

Much of the housing in East Lancashire is a national disgrace.

House prices are way below the national average and too many homes are left empty and abandoned.

It is a classic case of market failure.

In October 2001, I recall showing the then Housing and Regeneration Minister, Charlie Falconer, around Brierfield, pointing to a terraced property, with roof and windows intact and with an uninterrupted view of Pendle Hill, that was on the market for a jaw dropping £3,000.

Elevate, the housing market renewal organisation was set up in 2003 to help turn things around. It was scrapped by the Coalition government last year.

Yes, Elevate was responsible for a modest number of new builds but, across the patch, it refurbished and renovated thousands of properties.

Personally, I would have gone for a much more aggressive demolition policy but many influential local voices wanted to retain the old decrepit housing stock and called instead for renovation.

In Pendle, endless consultations initiated by the old Liberal throwback, Lord Tony Greaves, slowed everything down.

Yet, for all his many faults, Greaves understands the limitations of the market. In 2005 he told the Colne Times:

… the idea that the market alone will sort out the problems in the Waterside and South Valley areas is just a dream."

As true now as it was then.

So will the market step in and do what Elevate tried to do?

Dream on.

Attachments:

201103HMRelevateeastlancashire.pdf	[Elevate East Lancashire]	845 Kb
AGM 2006 page 1.pdf	[Pendle Party AGM 2006 page 1]	2603 Kb
AGM 2006 page 2.pdf	[Pendle Party AGM 2006 page 2]	3008 Kb