Archive for 2009
December 22nd, 2009 | 
Author: The current cold snap seems to have caught out Lancashire County Council (who are responsible for gritting the roads) with a shortage of grit, particularly in grit bins.
Gordon Birtwistle made several calls to County Hall highways officers over the weekend about the state of the borough’s snow-covered sidestreets and pavements.
He said: “The main roads in Burnley and Padiham have been gritted and I have got no issue with them, but the sideroads and pavements are treacherous.
“As well as that, the grit bins are all empty and it seems as if drivers have been helping themselves to the grit inside. My concern is for elderly residents.”
Update: Lib Dem County Councillor from Clitheroe, Allan Knox has posted this summary of how the County Council allocates priority routes for gritting and there is a link to a map highlighting those routes. As he points out whether the policy is right or wrong is a different matter!
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A Council is threatening to force a family with mobility difficulties to knock down the porch they built to store their mobility scooter and wheelchair because it is too close to the street.
But in a first use of new powers, Lib Dem councillors are seeking to intervene to get planning permission granted instead.
In an email to Queensgate ward Coun Darren Reynolds, a planning officer says that the porch is “not acceptable” and that it is a decision for council officers, not councillors.
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Another planning officer has told Coun Reynolds that planning permission is required for any development within two metres of the highway. She said that the porch was too big, and should have been built out of stone instead of PVC.
Mr Frank Davies, who lives with his wife, son and daughter, said of his son, “William hasn’t been able to walk since he caught TB and meningitis at the age of two. We’re not supposed to store the electric scooter in the house because of the fire risk, and anyway there just isn’t room for all the equipment.
“I did ask whether I needed planning permission before the porch was built and I was told that I didn’t. I also asked all my neighbours and they were all happy with the idea.
“But now someone has complained and the Council are saying that I shouldn’t have built it. I don’t know what we’re going to do. We spent a lot of money on the porch. It was well-made by a local firm and I thought I was doing the right thing.”
Coun Reynolds said, “I can’t understand why anyone would have a problem with this porch. It’s not blocking anyone’s window, it looks pretty enough, it’s built entirely on Mr Davies’ property in his small front yard. This is the only place it could go.
“But this is about more people than the Davies family. Accross Burnley, many people with mobility difficulties live in homes of a similar size. Often scooters or wheelchairs are kept in a corridor behind the front door because getting them any further into the house can be difficult. This creates a risk of minor injuries and falls when someone trips over them.
“Burnley Council has changed in recent years and is now doing a much better job at using common sense and listening to the town’s residents. The porch is helping this family with their mobility. Planning permission should be granted and I hope there will be a chance to change the officers’ minds.”
Coun Reynolds is hoping to be the first councillor in Burnley to use new powers to force such decisions out of the hands of officers and give them to a committee of councillors. This would allow the public to speak about the planning application at an open meeting in the Town Hall. |
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“It may prove that only extra money will permit Burnley to have its own facilities. If so, then the government needs to respond. Burnley people and their local representatives will always prioritise public health over illegal foreign wars, useless ID cards and disastrous defence procurement projects. This money must be spent instead on helping people to stay fit and healthy, and that is what we expect our government to do.”
Posted in Latest News, Local News, Local News, News | 
Tags: a&e, birtwistle, election, gordon, health, hospital, lib dems, nhs, petition, winning, won | 
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Now is the time for local hospital bosses to hold a truly independent inquiry into the closure of Burnley’s A&E unit.
“We now have a new Chair and Chief Executive of the local hospitals trust”, said local campaigner Gordon Birtwistle. “Now they can start to undo the mistakes made in recent years.”
The Trust’s new chief executive is also the Chief Exec for two successful A&Es in Halifax and Huddersfield. These serve two towns closer together and with a smaller population than Burnley and Blackburn and show that it is possible to have an effective solution with two A&E units.
Gordon led the fight against the Labour government’s plans to shut Burnley’s A&E unit and recently presented a petition signed by over 9000 local people calling for it to be re-opened.
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Thousands of police officers forced to retire after being injured in the line of duty face having their injury pensions cut back to minimum levels, research by the Liberal Democrats has found.
Previously, officers were allocated an additional sum each year to compensate them for the injuries they received, even when they reached retirement age. However, since Home Office guidance was issued in 2004, many forces have reassessed officers when they have reached retirement age and reduced their injury awards to the lowest possible level. The Government’s recent response to a consultation on this subject suggests that this practice is about to become more widespread. |
| Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne has written to Alan Johnson to demand that he put an end to the practice of police injury pensions being changed retrospectively.
Commenting, Chris Huhne said: “The thousands of police officers who have been injured in the line of duty are a reminder of what a dangerous and difficult job it can be. “As a result of Home Office guidance, many have had their injury pensions slashed and even more are at risk after the Government endorsed the policy in a recent consultation. “When ill health forced them to retire, they were promised that they would be compensated for the rest of their lives. It is unfair to move the goalposts now. “There is an exact parallel with the military covenant, and it will prove just as embarrassing to the Home Office as it was to the Ministry of Defence. “Hero cops who put their bodies on the line in the name of the public safety deserve to be more than just a victim of budget cuts. “These brave men and women are now faced with a hefty drop in income once they reach retirement age and a very uncertain future as a result. “This is another example of the Government breaking promises to those that choose to serve.” A copy of Chris Huhne’s letter to Alan Johnson can be read here. |
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We have been asked by the Labour Party to clarify the statement in the first paragraph of the above story.
Labour-run Burnley Council decided in January 2006 to introduce charges for the collection of bulky waste. At that time they voted to introduce a charge of £10 per collection (£11.75 including VAT) with plans for it to rise to £15 (£17.62 including VAT) for the 2007/8 financial year.
This policy was followed when the 2007/8 budget was set (Labour at this point had been voted out of running Burnley Council by local people)
There was an inflationary increase of 1.8% under the Lib Dems to £17.95 for the financial year 2008/9. As the article above makes clear the Lib Dem-run Council has since reduced this charge to the current £11.75 (inc VAT) which is well below the level intended by the previous Labour administration.
The opening paragraph has been redrafted to make this clearer. For transparency it is recorded that it originally read “Liberal Democrats on Burnley Council are demanding an end to the £17.95 charges introduced by the previous Labour executive for collecting bulky items.”
We are happy to provide this clarification.
Posted in Uncategorized |
Tags: birtwistle, campaign, election, gordon, hospital, lib dems, nhs, petition, results, winning, won |
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Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference today backed a series of proposals that will radically change the relationship between customers and companies.
The proposals include introducing a ‘Universal Service Code’ for organisations providing a service to the public. This will commit them to:
- Make one of the first options in their telephone response system be to speak to a human being
- Make their customer service phone number free to call from both mobiles and landlines
- Train staff to deal quickly and effectively with customer enquiries
- Make and keep appointments for visits, installations and phone calls within a one hour timeframe
The proposals also include:
- A duty for energy companies to publish information on all available tariffs on their bills
- The immediate clearing of bank payments and transfers
- A requirement for restaurants and cafes to make their tipping policies clear to customers
- A beefed up consumer watchdog to name and shame companies involved in bad practice
- Measures to prevent supermarkets building up local monopolies
Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Business Secretary, John Thurso said:
“Too often, customers find their relationships with companies and public bodies skewed against them.
“So many commonplace practices are infuriating for customers who just want to be treated fairly and honestly.
“When they have a problem or an enquiry about a service they have paid for, it is reasonable that they should be able to talk to a person and not a machine.
“Customers must have the power to make fair and informed choices without the fear of being taken for a ride and bewildered by mindless bureaucracy.”
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Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate Coun Gordon Birtwistle is demanding the re-opening of Burnley’s Accident and Emergency after discovering that the new East Lancs hospitals chief executive believes that two A&Es are needed even for a smaller population than that supported by just one A&E in East Lancashire.
And Burnley Council is set to pass a motion making its own demands at its next meeting. Led by the Lib Dems, the Council will insist that the decision to close the Burnley service be re-examined by outside experts, repeating the calls made by both Burnley and Pendle councils in February 2008, and echoing calls made recently by former hospital governors Ian Woolley and Peter Pike. The moves follow the delivery of petitions by Coun Birtwistle to the hospitals trust and to NHS East Lancashire containing a total of over 15,000 signatures. But incoming hospitals chair and former Labour County Council leader Hazel Harding said, “The Trust does not share the view that a further independent external assessment of emergency care is necessary. A further external assessment will not be commissioned by the Trust.”
The trust that manages Burnley and Blackburn hospitals has both a new chair and chief executive, and the Lib Dems believe this represents the best opportunity to get the A&E re-opened that Burnley is likely to have for several years.
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Lib Dem parliamentary candidate Coun Gordon Birtwistle said, “The new chair and chief executive were not part of the decision to close Burnley to emergencies. They bear no responsibility for it. There is no reason for them to insist on keeping it closed and they have nothing to lose by ordering a review of the decision.
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“The new chief executive also runs hospitals at Halifax and Huddersfield. Both these hospitals have an A&E but they are just 5.2 miles apart, much closer together than Burnley and Blackburn. These Yorkshire hospitals have no trouble meeting the A&E waiting time targets, the books are balanced and a national audit said these hospitals had the best probable survival outcomes for patients suffering major trauma, by which they mean things like traffic accidents.
“Burnley should have what Huddersfield has – the best outcomes for patients.
“The new chair needs to be bold and to meet the aspirations of the people who both pay for and use the service. She must not let herself be hoodwinked by what remains of the old management at the Trust.”
The Trust’s new chief executive splits her time between East Lancashire and the Halifax and Huddersfield areas.
Former trust governor and fellow Lib Dem Coun Darren Reynolds added, “The hospitals at Halifax and Huddersfield provide two A&Es for a population of around 435,000 people, but in East Lancs we have a single Emergency Department for over half a million people.
“It’s not just Halifax and Huddersfield that do better. Chorley and Royal Preston hospitals both offer an Accident and Emergency department. They are less than 14 miles apart, less than the distance between Burnley and Blackburn hospitals. The Chorley and Preston hospitals only cover 370,000 people, less than two thirds of the number of people in East Lancs.
“No-one is suggesting that these other areas would do better if one of their A&Es were shut.
“It is perfectly obvious to me that Burnley was downgraded for financial reasons. Board meeting minutes show that having an A&E at Burnley was not thought viable because it was too expensive. There are two reasons for that.
“One is poor management at the Trust. The breast cancer scandal does nothing to improve public confidence in the trust management, nor does the money wasted on the scrapped Foundation Trust bid, which should never have been started.
“The other reason is that we have a government that continues to prioritise killing people in foreign countries over saving people here. How can it be right to spend billions on new nuclear missiles when our own hospitals aren’t up to scratch?”
“This is unfair on Burnley. We’ve just as much right to the best health care as anywhere else in the country.
“But none of this can be blamed on either the new chair or the new chief executive. If they can get a grip of the situation and turn things around, the people of Burnley will be delighted.”
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Posted in Latest News, Local News, Local News, News |
Tags: a&e, birtwistle, campaign, gordon, health, hospital, nhs, petition |
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You may download the Press Release here, or read in the viewer below. To scroll in the viewer, just click anywhere on the document, and use the up and down arrow keys.
Coun Darren Reynolds, until recently a representative of the public on the Trust’s Council of Governors, said, “At a time like this thoughts turn immediately to the women involved and their families. It must be terrible for them to have to go through this, first being recalled, then being given the all-clear, only to discover in the end that they are affected by cancer.”
Coun Reynolds is calling for a full investigation into the mistakes to prevent the problem happening again.
He said, “There have been serious management failings at the Trust in the past and I do not know yet to what extent this might have contributed to the problem.
“I want to make sure that the situation is dealt with by the Trust to the complete satisfaction of those affected and of the wider public. I would be grateful if anyone who has direct experience of the situation were to get in touch. We have to make sure diagnosis is performed as carefully and accurately as is humanly possible every time, and I intend to make sure that the right action is taken.”
Coun Reynolds can be reached on 07973 174148 or dreynolds@burnley.gov.uk
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Burnley’s Liberal Democrats were tonight celebrating with Burnley people the news that another NHS service may return to Burnley General Hospital.
According to information uncovered by Burnley’s Liberal Democrats, NHS East Lancashire (formerly the PCT) has plans to return its out-of-hours GP service to the hospital. The move comes less than two years after out-of-hours GPs were moved out.
Leading hospitals campaigner and Burnley Council leader Coun Gordon Birtwistle said, “Drip by drip we are seeing services being returned to Burnley General.
“This was always the right place for the out-of-hours doctor to be. A lot of the time people go to the hospital when really they should be going to see their GP. By having the GPs at the hospital out-of-hours, it frees up staff to handle genuine hospital cases at busy times like Friday and Saturday nights.”
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 Gordon Birtwistle and a petition signee |
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Former hospital governor and Lib Dem Coun Darren Reynolds said, “It’s a pity that the services were moved out in the first place. Constantly moving things about creates confusion, when what people want at times of illness is simplicity.”
It is understood that appointments will need to be made to see the out-of-hours doctors at the hospital. It is not known when the move is due to take place.
Coun Birtwistle added, “One day we will also have a full A&E service restored at Burnley General. Burnley Council first called for an independent review of the changes in February 2008 but we got no response. Maybe now with the new chairman and chief executive at the hospitals trust, we have a new opportunity.”
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- State opening of parliament http://t.co/aRvafa20
- Good luck to lib dem candidates in Burnley & across the country. Well done for all your efforts & big thanks to all who helped campaign!
- Off to radio 4 now. It's been a long day
- I'm on 5 live doing election coverage now.
- RT @robinmeltzer: Londoners: a vote today for @LondonLibDems on the ORANGE BALLOT paper is a vote to stop racist #stopandsearch
Now they are closing the Childrens ward at Burnley General
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