another letter to my MP - privatising Healthcare and public sector pay changes

Dear Mel Stride,

hope this finds you well, many thanks for your prompt reply last week on the NHS Bill.

I didn't expect to be writing to you again so soon but I feel I have to raise it.

The first thing which concerns me and many others is the tendering of Devon Children's Services and how it seems likely to go to a private sector provider based on their wealth rather than experience of managing and delivering said services. Children's care (and I am calling it "care" not healthcare as these are integrated services) is quite complex and it worries e to think that these under-funded, high risk services will be sold off to the highest bidder, one which will want to make money from them!

This is being reported in the press as a direct link to the NHS bill but it is linked a little further back to the need for PCTs to split their provider and commissioning functions, something I understand and agree needed to be done as there was obviously a conflict with a PCT effectively paying itself to provide services it also commissioned. But, to push these services to the private sector is rash and dangerous. This isn't as simple as privatising simple (bounded) services, services which can be made to generate profit. I am sure you know about this proces as it covers your constituency but I have not seen much about it in the mainstream other than the reports at the end of the week which seem to have been leaked in some way.

Has this process been mentioned/discussed in Parliament? Is it a done deal?

The second thing which concerns and worries me is the proposal to freeze public sector pay til it falls in line with private; to scrap national pay scales; to regionalise pay. Following recent freezes and pension changes this will be crippling for a good chunk of the workforce. The cost of living is rising - fuel, food, everything - and this would seem set to lead to repossessions and child poverty, etc.

In a rural constituency such as yours and indeed a county which has a substantial number of properties as holiday homes and hence house prices which do not reflect average wages, this must not be allowed to come to pass! If anything fuel duties should be regionalised to reduce the burden on the rural workforce.

Again, thanks for your time.

Yours sincerely,

Rich Mills

A letter to my MP about the proposed health and social care bill

I wrote to my MP today regarding the Health & Social Care Bill. I'm sure you've heard about it but do you understand what it means to you? Really??

If you think the objections are simply about fat pensions for greedy public sector workers then for goodness sakes, stop what you're doing and start reading about it. The care you and your family receive for free now could soon disappear.

Here's what I wrote -

Dear Mel Stride,

I am writing to you to express my concern over the proposed health and social care bill. The impact and implications of this dangerous bill are far reaching and quite frankly scary for the majority of the population. Unfortunately the majority of the population will not understand the details of the bill or even need to but the implications are not being explained in clear language and instead serious concerns by professionals in all parts of the NHS are waved away and sadly passed off as "greedy public sector workers worried about their pensions" in outrageous spin articles in the Mail, Sun, etc.

I know you are a member of the conservatives and are obliged to tie the party line and will be pressured by the whips but you will understand the problems this bill will cause to your constituents, particularly the elderly and vulnerable.

I am appealing you to question everything and acknowledge your constituents before it is too late.

Yours sincerely,

Rich Mills

** update - a first reply **

I received an email from Mike Knuckey
(Assistant to Mel Stride MP)

"Dear Mr Mills

Thank you very much for contacting Mel Stride MP on the important issue of the government's NHS reforms and your concerns about the clarity with which they had been explained to the public, the issue of spin and press reaction and that of the role of party whips in relation to the way that MPs vote. I know that Mel will be particularly interested in your email as the NHS an Institution that he feels particularly supportive of and he also has concerns about the way in which some commentators are positioning the government's drive to improve the NHS

We will deal with your email as soon as possible and Mel will be in touch."

There was a bit more about signing up for updates but not relevant to this.

So, Mel has concerns as to how some commentators are positioning the government's attempts to improve the NHS?

Nobody has an issue with improvements, in face NHS outcomes have improved significantly over the past few years and is still improving and making changes to cope with an expanding, elderly population as well as increasing problems such as obesity and it's related conditions.

I do hope that Mel and his colleagues aren't writing off concerns as left-wing noise.

Mighty Mariners Memorabilia

I wasn't sure what to title this blog and to be honest I'm not even sure what the point of it is.

I've just had these things for a while now and thought I'd share them. I always meant to frame these along with a couple of other Grimsby Town matchday programmes and hang them on the wall but I never got round to it so here I am now, 13 or 14 years later, hanging them on the wall of my inconsistent blog site. Is there a point to it other than I think they're pretty cool?
Not really :)

I love the idea that in the not too distant past, whenever Grimsby achieved anything there would be a commemorative cover. 

Football fans and stamp collectors. The same demographic obviously. This one celebrates the 80th anniversary in 1972 of Town being elected into the Football League. Town were formed in 1878 and were elected in 1892. One of the things I love about this is the price of the stamp - 2 1/2p - and this was when it would have still been new pence :)

1972 was a pretty good year. Deep Purple released the Machine Head album and my sister Kate was born!  

The next one is also from 72 and celebrates Town getting promoted from the 4th division as champions.

Note: 4th division, kids? League 2 nowadays. Things were simpler back then and of course BETTER.

This cover is a wild design too. Look a space! Let's add a fish and it's saying "match result". Or something. A plaice in a goal net? Red and green ink? A trawler? A trophy? Chuck it all on there! Hold on, leave room for the stamp!!

These things also came with a commemorative card which took the piss for the amount of times they'd been relegated and promoted or re-elected.

Whoever wrote this would have a field day after the last few years of relegations!

Look carefully at this - record attendance at Blundell Park = 31, 654! I just can't imagine what that must have been like. The card also mentions noted players, one of which is the legendary Jackie Bestall, capped by England in the 30s. BEstall had a street named after him in Cleethorpes. Not many players get that honour. Perhaps fittinly for a player only 5' 5" tall, Bestall Road is/was the shortest road in Grimsby/Cleethorpes.

This next one celebrates Grimsby's return to the 2nd division

(they call it the championship now but we're not fooled are we?) afer finishing the 79/80 season as champions of division 3.

It's a lot neater but look at the price of that stamp! 11 1/2p! The cover also came with a card (below) which was sponsored by The Mirror. At least it wasn't the Daily Mail.

 

Moving away from stamps, here's a pretty cool matchday programme from 1966

when Town were playing in the 3rd division and against local rivals Scunthorpe. Enough about them though.

I love anything with the dock tower on it and Grimsby programmes are no exception. I love driving into the town on the A180 and seeing the tower. Only those lucky enough to have been born in Grimsby or Cleethorpes can even begin to appreciate this.  

The back cover had a great ad for Hewitts Ales. Back in the day footballers were positively encouraged to get on it after a game!

  

 Last bit of the programme now, I promise.

Check out the team sheet - Ron Cockerill, father of future players Glenn and John and Keith Jobling at centre half who was the holder of the appearance record for Town until overtaken by Saint John McDermott. Matt Tees - another legend at inside right.

I think this formation was referred to as 2-3-5. We played it at school in the 70s, early 80s.

Harry Wainman is a name I remember from my youth; not because I saw Harry play (I didn't) but beacuse after hanging his boots up Harry had a sports shop on Freeman Street, Grimsby. My dad used to take me in there to get boots, laces, that sort of thing. The shop wasn't far from St Mary's chool where he taught and I seem to remember he knew Harry to chat too. Maybe because he had taught the Moore brothers - Andy, Dave and Kevin - I think all 3, and he went to the same church as former Grimsby manager Lawrie McMenemy. I wish I could check whether he taught all 3 Moores.

Check out the left back. Graham Taylor. Yep, that Graham Taylor, future England Manager. I remember being at home one evening and Lawrie McMenemy ringing to speak to my dad but being in a bit of a hurry as he was in Poland as assistant manager to Taylor and the call was really expensive.