Postman Pat-Johnson delivered a letter to GPs today outlining his plans for extending surgery opening hours. Junk Mail more like. Once again in the 'do you want to jump before you are pushed' correspondence he refers to a consultation. This was a word missed out of the brilliant CPS 2008 Lexicon, but can be defined in nuLabspeak as 'pre-announcement of an initiative for comment where comments will be ignored; funded by the tax payer'. So whether our GPs agree to longer opening hours or not, they are going to have to provide them.
Is this what all local communities need? How would the DoH know? Even past authors of NHS 'reform' such as Paul Corrigan last week told the Health Service Journal that civil servants were completely cut off from the reality of front-line healthcare professionals. Yet despite knowing centrally imposed solutions didn't relate to local situations, Labour have persisted in Centralism.
A good local GP will know their patients, know what the community needs and what its priorities are because they have listened and built relationships. Unless and until healthcare professionals are freed to serve their communities based on local needs, local accountability and priorities worked out with the community, they will continue to receive junk mail from the SoS - which costs patients and professionals alike money, excellence and progress.
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