Letters to the Editor - 20th June 2008

Jun 20 2008 Liverpool Daily Post

Check the facts out first

RE: POLYCLINICS. Some super GP surgery centres or polyclinics have been set up with five-year contracts, and experts say that any activity below 100%will represent a complete waste of money.

The problem under the present rules is that this could be determined only at the end of the contracts, when it would be clear how many operations the polyclinic had, in fact, done.

PCT figures put a different gloss on the situation by including extra short-term programmes launched supposedly to shift the backlog in areas of non-urgent treatment facilities.

When those are included, it says that the programme is now working at 84% of capacity.

The first polyclinics were set up under contracts that guaranteed an income based on the number of patients they promised to treat, regardless of whether that number were actually treated.

Overall, 20 centres should be treating patients at the rate of 79,000 a year, assuming that the target numbers are averaged over the whole of the five-year contract.

However, in the first 12-month period to March, the actual treatment rate was 46,000 patients a year, only 59% of their target numbers.

In a feeble defence of the polyclinics, it was claimed that many have not been open long, and the numbers they treat have not had time to build up. This will, of course, change with the closure of traditional GP surgeries. So much for patient choice!

Expert individual and independent official reports call for PCT organisations to learn from the exhaustive findings with reference to the existing performance figures, before embarking on wholesale introduction of these so-called “Polyclinics” or whatever title is used.

Mary Scondane, via email

Faith no more

SOME days ago, Harry Ross in your Thought for the Day suggested we read the Bible. Nothing is more certain than if you read the Bible, you lose your faith.

There are certain guidelines in this life we must all adhere to. If you belong to any group, team, association or religion you must accept all the rules. You can’t pick which rules apply to you and which don’t.

Can you imagine a football team walking out on to the pitch and explaining to the referee that their team does not agree to corners or the offside rule, or a motorist who doesn’t agree with driving on the left? Things don’t work like that.

In the same way, a Christian cannot say, when reading the Bible, “I believe that: I don’t believe that” and so on. If you believe any, you must believe all. For instance, Adam and Eve being the first people on Earth 6,000 years ago, even though some people were living in cities at that time. Noah with his puny craft saving all species of animals and insects from all over the world. Impossible. Jonah and the Whale. A whale cannot swallow a man. And Moses leading a million or more people traipsing through the desert for more than 40 years. Even Rommel could not have done that.

So, when you realise that the Bible is full of all these silly stories, you begin to think, and the quickest way out of Christianity is when you start to think.

CP Kelly, Gateacre

Defeat bullying

FRIDAY, June 6, was a big occasion for schools who took part in Defeat Bullying Day 2008. On behalf of ChildLine, I would like to thank all the students and staff who made the day such a success.

Bullying is the most common problem children ring ChildLine about, and our volunteer counsellors say it is one of the most painful problems they have to deal with.

Of course, bullying does not stop at the school gates, it happens on buses and trains, on street corners and in playgrounds. It can follow a child home with texts and emails. Last August, ChildLine received 2,000 calls from desperate children made miserable by bullies in their holiday time.

I would like to remind young people that ChildLine is open every day on 0800 1111 and is free and confidential.

If any readers would like to join our battle against bullying, they can at www.justgiving.com/btdefeetbullying

Esther Rantzen, President of ChildLine

Government blame

THE Government, at the city's annual Mansion House dinner, excused itself of responsibility for rising prices and the credit crunch – with them being referred to as unavoidable global phenomena.

The Government is more than partially responsible. though. The invasion of Iraq reduced oil supply significantly and increased demand significantly.

Additionally, when coming into power in 1997, Labour knew that action was need to tackle an ageing electricity generation supply, dwindling oil and gas reserves, and the ageing and inadequate oil refining capacity – all of which Labour kept on postponing action upon. Labour has also carried out polices that have seen a massive increase in population increasing demand for energy and food.

Labour have also failed to deal with Mugabe, in Zimbabw,e which has seen a large-scale agricultural producer and exporter now requiring large-scale food aid.

Finally, the Government failed to tackle the much-heralded credit crunch by failing to legislate or otherwise take action when UK banks were involved in the highly speculative US sub-prime loan bonanza.

Mark Bill, address supplied

No deals

I’M AFRAID Cllr Eddie Clein was always going to be disappointed if he thought the defection of Les Byrom from Conservative to Labour would somehow elevate him to become Chairman of the Merseyside Fire Authority (Defecting councillor quits fire authority, Daily Post, June 18).

As the new Leader of the Conservative Group on the Fire Authority, I will not do any deal that jeopardises the really important work of our fire fighters.

And, as a councillor in Wirral, I will take no lectures from a Liberal Democrat about doing deals with Labour that ignores the democratic will of the people. In this borough, the Conservatives easily won the most votes and the most seats, yet it was the Liberal Democrats who did the deal to allow Labour to cling on.

Cllr Lesley Rennie, Leader of the Conservative Group, Merseyside Fire Authority

Don’t listen

WAYNE HEMINGWAY comes up with all sorts of grand ideas for Liverpool’s redevelopment, but one can only hope that no-one in the Town Hall is listening.

It took us eight years just to build a shopping centre with all the accompanying false starts and whingeing about “heritage”, etc. Can you imagine what an unholy mess Liverpool city council would be able to get itself into, were it to start building an “eco town”?

Just think how much money we would be able to lose on that sort of project.

LK, Mossley Hill

Open door policy

WHILE endorsing the comments of Mr Horgan (Daily Post, June 13) on the charmless interior of the Bluecoat building (white walls, dropped ceilings, spotlights – to match the new shops, perhaps), may I take issue with his last sentence: “at least nobody has modernised the Walker yet”). I assume he has not registered the abrupt disappearance of the impressive wooden revolving doors, a feature of the entrance to the building and much loved by children.

These served not only as a secret entrance beyond which you entered with delight a veritable palace, but also as a device for maintaining an even temperature and a deterrent to thieves and vandals. Alas, they are, as I understand, banished to Quiggins. Which feature of this building will be the next to disappear?

DM Lane, Heswall

We’ll show ’em

HAVING seen the pictures of the ladies at Ascot, the race meet favoured by Royalty, I think the girls at our Ladies Day more than hold their own.

In April, there was a lot of comment about how our ladies dressed at the Grand National, and it seemed to be dismissed as over the top and tacky. In fact, the majority looked polished and beautiful, as they did at the Chester Races.

Flesh on show or not, the lot at Ascot aren’t as colourful to look at, and even the youngsters look a frumpy bunch, and I include in that Zara Phillips.

They should come up to Liverpool next year and see how it’s done.

Ted Hanrahan, Birkenhead

Cover price

I TAKE issue with R Dyke, of Preston, who complained about umbrellas being confiscated during the Paul McCartney concert at Anfield (Letters, June 10).

If he had not seen any of the concert because the person in front of him had their umbrella up, then I’m sure he would have complained about that, too.

It’s not a big deal – we had already paid a lot for the ticket, so what difference does another £10 or so for another umbrella make?

Anyway, you could go and pick your umbrella up at a later date if were really all that bothered about it.

If you were worried about the rain, then you should have worn a cagoule.

P Harvey, Allerton

Where are the fans?

EVERTON FC should be renamed the “Missing People’s Club”. Once again, we finished 10th in the attendance league. I am sick of hearing what great supporters we are when we can only fill our ground for the first and last games of the season, and for matches against Liverpool and Man United.

If it is true that all Scousers are Evertonians, then we only manage 34,000 in a 40,000-seater stadium?

T Shields, Aigburth

Angelic memory

RE: THE Tunnel walk. My elderly father-in-law walked through the Tunnel in 1934 when it had just opened. He recalls he spotted a sign on the walk saying: “You are now under the Angel Hotel.”

His reply: “I wish I was in it.”

ML Simpson (Mrs), L12