Our A&E Postcode Lottery

Since its inception, the Directors of the Mid Yorkshire Hospital Trust with the aid of our MP, the then Junior Health Minister, have fought to balance a budget, have centralised and decentralised, have "consulted", re-organised, re-configured and latterly wiped away clinical and emergency services before demolishing the buildings that made up Pontefract General Infirmary. They have entered into a 30 year term multi million pound PFI to give us the new "Pontefract Hospital" which is a third of the size of the old Infirmary. The majority of beds and services are now in Wakefield or Dewsbury and with all its coffee shops, newsagents, high ceilings and gates what we are left with is an airport departure lounge with the capabilities of an outpatient clinic.

From the 1st of November, less than 12 months after the grand opening, we are faced with "temporary" night time closures of the emergency A&E department robbing us of a vital resource and putting extra pressure on other hospitals within the trust and beyond. The residents of the five towns on the eastern side of the district, travellers on the East Coast main line railway, the M62 and A1, people from West and North Yorkshire who have, in the past, depended on Pontefract facilities are now in a post code lottery through the hours of darkness. So don't be ill, take care, do not be involved in a serious accident, or you will have to be taken to Wakefield, Dewsbury, Leeds or even Doncaster as the clock ticks through your golden hour for survival. This is just not good enough.

To the directors of the Trust who state that they cannot attract doctors to their shiny new facility, please ensure that this temporary closure is overturned at the earliest opportunity. If, as Directors you are tempted to go for a full closure and transition to a first aid clinic as some people have suggested,then, after everything else that you have done, it might be better if you sit down and write out your resignations now.

The people of this district deserve better.

Geoff Walsh

Community day of action at Chequerfield and Willow Park

Pontefract today, a sunny day with showers.

An observant person would have spotted Walsh with a team of youngsters from Cobblers Lane School, a community police person dressed like a weetabix/padlock (you really do need to lock your outbuildings)other members of the neighbourhood policing team. A team from the West Yorkshire Fire Service, Council grounds maintenance teams, Wakefield District Housing, Friends of Pease Field, members of the public, Countryside Rangers, Council Officers and a variety of members of the media at Pease Field this morning. This was part of a wider programme of action that included activity across Chequerfield.

We planted plants and bushes, we litter picked, the youngsters had specific lessons that were fun and we put a marker down that we want to see our community as a safer, cleaner and greener place to live.

As part of the process there were other elements going on, anti-social behaviour hot spots being worked on to make them less easy for those up to no good. A community garden to be started adjacent to Holy Family Car Park, paths and rights of way cleared. Community pay back to be invoked with people under community pay back orders doing positive things for the people of the district.

Felt really worthwhile, old and young getting stuck in with gusto. Interestingly the media observed but missed the opportunity to plant a single tree or pick up a piece of litter.

This will not be a one off and is not before time.

And another one bites the dust..

Just seen a press release about the closure of the Hornsea Centre by WMDC using the same political spin as our MP. She cites "government cuts" as the reason for closures at our local A&E at Pontefract Hospital rather than a combination of cuts implemented by her own government and the PFI that she drove through. This has given the health trust a big modern building, few services, fewer beds and a huge ongoing financial problem, with little means to make it work. In the case of the Hornsea Centre, the Director of Family Services appears to have been trying to write it out of her personal script and kingdom for the last 5 years and the Portfolio Holder and Labour Cabinet are now also talking "government cuts".

From its opening in 1937, the Hornsea Centre has been a much loved resource which gave many school children from Wakefield their first chance to see the sea. Over the years that they have controlled the centre, Wakefield Council have bled it dry of resources to the point where the £1.5m cost of upgrading is such that they cannot even get a buyer to take it as a going concern. My bet is that with land cleared it will be sold off for housing or some such.

Looks like there is a general clearing of the decks using "Government Cuts" as an excuse to avoid admitting to poor judgement, overspending, under resourcing of key services such as highway repairs across the district or diversion of funding to pet projects by the Labour Cabinet of the Council.

35 years of Labour control coming home to roost and affecting the people of Wakefield, Pontefract and the rest of the Five Towns.

Yvette Cooper a Hypocrite? She made pledges for votes and the A&E is to close.

Standing at the entrance to the Hospital, the former Labour Junior Health Minister who drove the legislation setting up of Mid Yorks Hospital Trust that provided a Chairman's post to her predecessor and a directorship to a former local Labour Councillor, our MP supported a review that effectively closed the existing Pontefract General Infirmary and replaced it with a modern, smaller less capable facility. She made promise after promise about what it could do and as a Treasury Minister supported a series of PFIs Pontefract's included that put the NHS deeper and deeper in debt and brought about potential privatisation of services by the backdoor.

Now she cites government cuts on the BBC for a closure under a load of debt arising from the actions of her Labour administration.....and the people of Pontefract and the Five Towns are asked to trust her and join in her campaign?

Get Nick Pickles view here

Say no to Cooper but vote to keep our 24/7 Emergency A&E.

Your help is needed! ......Save our A&E

This has been on the cards ever since our MP pushed the PFI through and offered an electoral promise in 2005 that our new hospital would be safe in her hands.

Now our emergency A&E is scheduled to cease night-time cover from the 1st November as part of MYH Trusts planned deletion of services in Pontefract and bleed off of services to Pinderfields and Dewsbury Hospital.

Please sign the Pontefract & Castleford Express petition to keep the A&E open here