Memo to the NHS: we are not a blank sheet of paper

Published: 26 February 2010

• ACCORDING to Steve Conroy, “an NHS official” (who was introduced as “Rachel Tyndall’s assistant” at January’s Whittington meeting), there is now a “clinical model” dictating closure of Whittington A&E, and a “clinical advisory group” which has drawn this up, and it even has firm recommendations (Fears for jobs as A&E axe looms, February 19).
In November, the idea of closing Whittington A&E had come, NHS London claimed, from a confidential report by management consultants McKinsey. Last month, Ms Tyndall told a packed audience the idea had come from Lord Darzi’s report, Healthcare for London, commented on by all of 3,500 Londoners. At least that is public.
Now there’s supposed to be a 90 per cent-decided “clinical model” to be imposed on five north London boroughs as though they were “a blank sheet of paper”. The appearance of making it up as they go along is becoming farcical.
Mr Conroy reached for tragedy, however, with his blithe dismissal of the “random” historical reasons healthcare is delivered where it is in the boroughs he helps Ms Tyndall oversee. Concentrations of people needing healthcare in certain areas over time have had nothing to with it, obviously. How 20th century, when beds can be modelled on a blank sheet of paper.
The experience we’ve had while fighting to save Finsbury Health Centre suggests that even if this “clinical model” exists it may not support a case for closure. We have seen a lot of this sort of thing over the past year and a half. NHS Islington has been extremely reluctant to divulge its sources, and, as has become clear from Islington Council’s health and wellbeing review committee’s exhaustive investigation, misrepresented them. It took over a year to see the feasibility study from which it conjured the claimed capital cost, likewise proper information about where the patients of different health centre services actually live, evidence ignored entirely by the primary care trust (PCT) executive.
They based their case on not only how expensive they said the health centre would be to refurbish, but also, directly contradicting their own three-year feasibility study, on how supposedly unsuitable the building is to refurbish for “21st century healthcare”.
As expert after expert told the council and public last autumn, none of the PCT’s case on cost, on suitability for change, on patient need or on ease of transport holds up under examination.
Yet now that there really “can be no argument” with the realities concerning the health centre, Ms Tyndall is still determined to fight this through. So much for evidence-based decision-making.
The health and wellbeing committee will be deciding whether to refer the closure of the health centre back to the Department of Health at 7.30pm on Monday in the Town Hall. Join us in letting NHS officials know that our communities do not dwell on a blank sheet of paper.
BARB JACOBSON
Campaign to Save Finsbury Health Centre
www.savefhc.org.uk

• MOST people reading this will have visited Whittington A&E at some point in their lives, either accompanying a friend or relative, or as a patient. So the proposed loss of the A&E is a threat to the safety of all of us.
If you live or work in Haringey, Islington or Camden then you need to show your support for the hospital by joining me on the protest march this weekend. The unaccountable NHS authorities are attempting to downsize the Whittington by getting rid of the A&E department. A hospital without an A&E department rapidly becomes little more than a health centre, without ability to undertake major surgery for emergencies as well as many other services.
Living in crowded communities, with rising populations and with many different work and leisure activities (including Arsenal football matches), there is no end to the demand made on the local A&E.
The two public meetings that I called at Archway Methodist Hall were amazingly well attended by people from all walks of life and political persuasions, and the audiences challenged the NHS authorities to explain themselves.
On both occasions the audience’s mood was one of defiance, since most people have no reason to believe any cuts will stop there, and it’s not hard to see why. The loss of Whittington A&E is bound to be the first step in a run of cuts, and those in need will have to travel much further (in London traffic), probably up narrow one-way systems, to the Royal Free A&E, which is not easy to get to and has limited access. There is nothing more important to residents than showing support and concern about what might happen to their hospital. The fact that so much money has been spent on the hospital in recent years seems to have passed the authorities by.
Please support the Defend the Whittington Campaign this Saturday. The march will be made up of a huge cross-section of people, many of them never having protested in their lives before, but in this case their lives may depend on it.
See you on Saturday.
JEREMY CORBYN
Labour MP, Islington North

• I HAVE been impressed by the Tribune campaign to save the Whittington A&E unit. It’s great to see local newspapers taking such a leading role in supporting this much-loved resource. There is no doubt that the NHS in London is at crisis point. Rising patient numbers and increased costs mean health bosses are under pressure to save billions over the next few years. 
Londoners are facing the heaviest health cuts in the country at £673 per head, and here in Islington we are looking at the loss of our much-needed A&E unit. This is after 12 years of a Labour government.  Something has gone very badly wrong.
According to campaign group Health Emergency, efficiency savings planned by the capital’s health chiefs are nearly double anywhere else in England – more than £5billion. This compares with £800million in the East Midlands and £1.3billion by the South Central strategic health authority.
Dr John Lister, from Health Emergency, says London faces a “decimation” of health services – maybe a third of the capital’s hospital beds could go. 
We know in Islington that this is exactly what we face. We have already lost the A&E at Bart’s – despite Labour promises to reopen it – and now we have Whittington A&E under threat. Our own regional health body in North and Central London is facing up to £500million of these “cuts”. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth the way Labour locally tries to distance itself from the shambles NHS funding has become.  Residents know where the real blame rests.
CLLR TERRY STACY
Lib Dem leader, Islington Council