Boris Johnson MP: Support for Community Hospitals to be welcomed but rhetoric must be backed up by action
Boris Johnson MP, responding to Patricia Hewitt’s statement announcing the creation of a £750m funding pot set aside for capital investment in Community Hospitals, today said:
‘Any extra money set aside specifically for community hospitals is to be welcomed.
However it is hard not to feel that we have been here before. It is vital that this time round the Secretary of State’s rhetoric is matched by action. Previous pledges of support have too often failed to result in practical help materialising on the ground.
We don’t want a community hospital regeneration plan that involves closing community hospitals. It is no use investing in infrastructure if services are not funded to match.
PCTs must be helped and encouraged to access this money. In the meantime there must be a moratorium on any further closures’.
Ends
Boris Johnson MP: Community Hospital Rally a Triumph – Time Now for Hewitt to Act
Commenting on the success of yesterday’s CHANT (Community Hospitals Acting Nationally Together) Rally, at which upwards of 1,000 people attended, Boris Johnson MP said:
‘I was thrilled so many people were able to make it and would like to thank each and every one of those who turned up for taking the time and trouble to do so. It was a huge demonstration of support by local people for these community hospitals.
The whole day went exceedingly well, everybody behaved with incredible politeness and good humour, but this should not mask just how strongly people feel about this and how important the issue at stake really is.
We must continue to keep up the pressure until we get a firm commitment from Patricia Hewitt that she will match the rhetoric of the Health White Paper with action. She must accept real responsibility for the current mess and finally step in to save all those community hospitals, including Townlands, that remain under imminent threat of closure’.
Ends
More local news and campaigns on the local Oxfordshire website
Note to Editors
Video feedback of the event available, courtesy of Felixstowe TV, at:
http://www.felixstowetv.co.uk/06/mar/hoc1.html
Boris Johnson MP: Lets Make CHANT (Community Hospitals) Rally a Success
Supporters of community hospitals from around the country are today attending the first National Community Hospitals Rally in London. Despite welcome recognition of the importance of the services provided by community hospitals in the recent Health White Paper, cuts and closures are continuing.
Over 300,000 people have already signed local petitions supporting their community hospitals and delegations from across England will be in attendance. The rally will be addressed by the Chairman and Vice-Chairman of CHANT, Graham Stuart and Boris Johnson MP, by Andrew Lansley, the Shadow Secretary of State for Health, and by Steve Webb, the Liberal Democrat Health spokesman. Patricia Hewitt, Secretary of State for Health, has also been invited to speak.
Commenting on the Rally, Boris Johnson MP said:
‘I am delighted so many people seem prepared to travel from all around the country to come to this event. Despite recent reassurances in the Health White Paper, many communities are seeing their local hospitals being wound down or closed – this Rally is proof that this is not what people want.
I only hope that when Patricia Hewitt glances out her window in the Commons and catches sight of the assembled throng that she take to heart their message, that these community hospitals are an absolutely vital and valued local resource and must not be closed merely in response to some end of year budgetary crunch. I will in addition keep my fingers firmly crossed the sun continues to shine!’
ENS
Notes to Editors:
CHANT is holding a national rally outside Parliament on March 28th from 1pm to 2pm to highlight the continued threat to more than 80 community hospitals and demand that action is taken by the Government.
CHANT is a cross-party group campaigning for community hospitals. It has Labour, Liberal Democrat, Independent and Conservative MPs and Peers as Patrons. Further information about CHANT, including details of the national rally to be held in London on March 28th, can be found on the CHANT website:
www.chantonline.com
email [Email address: email #AT# chantonline.com - replace #AT# with @ ]
U-turn on Community Hospitals
31 January 2006
Boris Johnson MP: We Must Hold Hewitt to her Word
Boris Johnson MP, yesterday welcomed the Health Secretary’s apparent U-turn on Community Hospitals.
Community Hospitals
17 January, 2006
MPs and local activists come together to fight for community hospitals
Local hospital campaigners from across the country joined forces yesterday in an attempt to prevent a wave of community hospital cuts and closures. Many Primary Care Trusts are in deficit and are under intense pressure to balance their books by April.
The result is likely to be front line cuts to many local community hospitals. Representatives of Leagues of Friends, local campaign groups, MPs, Councillors, community leaders, and residents, attended a one day seminar to share campaigning tips, build alliances and develop strategies to reverse the cutbacks to such vital, local health services.
The seminar comes less than ten weeks after the launch of CHANT (Community Hospitals Acting Nationally Together), a cross-party umbrella organisation set up to lobby Ministers, and raise awareness of the nation-wide threat to community hospitals. The group is chaired by Graham Stuart MP and the vice-chair is Boris Johnson MP. CHANT is supported by more than 40 MPs including Labour, Liberal Democrat, Conservative and Independent members. Chairman of CHANT, Graham Stuart MP, said:
‘This joint conference between CHANT and the Community Hospitals Association aims to support all those who are concerned about the future of their community hospital services. It will develop a network of support for campaigners who are battling hard to save their local health services.’
Over 80 community hospitals, including Townlands hospital in Henley, are currently under threat. The seminar included sessions on potential legal challenges to cutbacks and allowed campaigners to share tips and advice on working with the press and lobbying politicians.
Vice Chairman, Boris Johnson MP, commented:
‘It is appalling to see these vital hospitals facing such an unprecedented threat. If the Government persists with this policy, it should have the decency to explain the logic of this frankly bizarre decision to the British public, rather than continuing to hold up its hands and pointing the blame at the PCT’s, who are after all, unelected and unaccountable.’
Practical Action Needed on Climate Change
23 November 2005
Boris Johnson MP: Practical Action Needed on Climate Change
Speaking in yesterdays Climate Change Opposition Day Debate, Boris Johnson MP called on the Government to match its climate change rhetoric with action by removing planning restrictions, unaltered since 1995, governing the installation of rooftop solar panels.
Arguing in favour of increasing the energy efficiency of our nation’s housing stock as one of the most cost effective ways of reducing our consumption of energy and carbon dioxide emissions Mr Johnson outlined:
A single policy initiative, which I am sure will meet universal approval among Labour Members and my hon. Friends …For an outlay of £3000 Mrs. Anley (of Sonning Common) can add to her roof a wonderful panel by which she can heat her water. It is a photovoltaic pump. She assures me – I have no reason to doubt her, since I have taken the trouble to look up her plans on the internet – that she can reduce her carbon emissions by half a tonne of Co2 a year and that she can supply up to 70 per cent of her hot water needs in doing so. The kicker is that she has to get planning permission …
Mr Johnson pointed out that:
The device that Mrs Anley seeks to install is only 2ft by 4ft and only 8cm thick, but to get planning permission, she must pay a non-negotiable flat fee of £135. She must then get an architectural artist to produce drawings of her house, which, as you will readily appreciate, Mr Deputy Speaker, will push her costs well over £200 … I look forward to hearing later that he (the Minister) is going to do a little bit more than set up a committee in the DTI to clarify matters, because this needs to be done urgently, and he is the man to do it.
Solar panels currently fall into Class C (roof alterations), of Schedule 2, Article 3, Part 1 of the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) Order 1995.
