Thousands of pharmacies are on the brink of closure – just as the Tories seek to rely on them to bail out struggling GPs.

Mirror.co.uk

A report by the National Pharmacy Association predicts 3,000, almost one in four, could shut by next year following years of funding cuts.

The Government announced plans this week to let pharmacists give prescriptions for seven common ailments.

Tories hope the policy, starting in winter, will end the daily 8am scramble for GP appointments.

But pharmacists branded the move unachievable.

Anil Sharma, boss of nine ­pharmacies in Health Secretary Steve Barclay’s North East Cambridgeshire patch, said: “Our primary function – dispensing medicines – is underfunded. Pharmacies haven’t had a pay rise for eight years so we are really struggling financially.”

Mr Sharma, 49, in the business for 25 years, said the cuts are also causing a workforce shortage as staff tell him they can earn more at McDonald’s.

So read a sign recently erected by a farmer in Stockleigh, Mid Devon.

Cornwall seems to be experiencing the same problems as Devon.

There are also widespread reports across the country of people planting flowers in potholes. – Owl

Who filled Cornwall’s ‘biggest pothole’? No one’s telling the council

A phantom pothole filler has struck in the town of Lostwithiel after becoming fed up that the “biggest pothole in Cornwall” had not been fixed, even though the council closed the road for more than a month.

Will Humphries www.thetimes.co.uk

Highway officials are now calling for anyone with information about the identity of the unknown repairer to contact them.

The main route between Lostwithiel and Bodmin was closed by the council at the beginning of last month after residents complained for months about a 40cm deep pothole, measuring 2.5m by 3.2m.

Last Sunday someone filled it with concrete and reopened the road. Cornish Highways has since closed it again and says the hole will not be fixed until next month at the earliest, because of a backlog of potholes.

Geoff Barrett, 73, a retired journalist who lives locally, spotted someone with a pick-up truck parked by the closed road on Sunday afternoon. Four hours later the road was open. “It did surprise me that someone from the council would be working on a bank holiday weekend,” he said. “I didn’t realise it was someone taking things into their own hands.”

Kay Bevan, 78, who lives near the pothole, said her neighbours appeared to know who is responsible “but everyone is feigning ignorance”.

“Because it’s a B road it’s not a high priority for the council, but it’s a major road for locals getting to Bodmin,” she said.

Colin Martin, the Liberal Democrat councillor for the town, said the pothole filler represented the “shared frustration” of drivers across the country with the state of the nation’s crumbling road network. “The filled-in pothole isn’t perfect but it’s still better than most of the roads that the council are supposed to be maintaining at the moment,” he said.

Rishi Sunak promised a clampdown on potholes at the launch of the Conservative local election campaign last month, and posed for photographs on a crumbling road in Darlington, Co Durham. The prime minister said new powers would help to ensure firms repair roads properly after carrying out works, through more fines and inspections.

Martin said Cornwall had a good record of road maintenance until the Conservatives won control of the council two years ago and cut spending.

“A road maintenance inspector told me the other day they would normally be finding 300 potholes a week but now they are finding 1,000 a week,” Martin said.

“Previously if I reported a pothole within 24 hours the green paint would be painted around it and it would be filled in by the next day. We are now at the stage where green paint appears within 24 hours but the pothole stays there for weeks on end.”

A manager wrote: “If information regarding who carried out the works becomes known in the community, I would be grateful if details could be shared. At the present time, we have a significant backlog of pothole defects across the network and our resource is allocated to this as a priority over other planned works. The work at Tanhouse Road will be scheduled when the situation eases.”

Connor Donnithorne, the Conservative council portfolio holder for transport, told cabinet this week that the council had received an additional £5 million from the government towards its “pothole fund”. This is added to £12 million spent on mending potholes and other road repairs in Cornwall each year.

A council spokesman said: “There is an ongoing issue with drainage at this site which has led to the deterioration of the road surface. These drainage issues have meant that any surface repairs during the winter have been temporary.

“As we are now moving into warmer and drier weather, Cormac [the maintenance company] can programme in the permanent drainage and surfacing repairs needed at this site.”

Residents across the country have been taking action to draw attention to their deteriorating roads. Villagers fed up with a “nightmare” pothole in Blythe Bridge, Staffordshire, recently added rubber ducks to the crater after it flooded in rainfall.

A farmer in Stockleigh English, Devon, erected a sign last month warning motorists: “Potholes ahead. Remove dentures. Fasten bra straps.” Carol Perryman said: “I keep reporting it at Devon Highways but nothing gets done.”

The chief executive of David Cameron’s legacy project for young people has continued to be paid his £165,000 salary, despite committing to review his pay before the charity had more than 60 per cent of its funding cut.

David Cohen  www.independent.co.uk

Mark Gifford was appointed head of the National Citizen Service Trust in early 2020 when almost £160m of taxpayers’ money was lavished on the NCS by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.

But a government review has since shrunk their budget to less than £60m a year following an investigation by The Independent that showed the charity was failing to provide value for money.

Mr Gifford had admitted that cuts were needed to make NCS pay for senior executives “better aligned to the third sector” and to “take into account market forces”.

His comments formed part of an investigation by The Independent that revealed that the senior NCS team were being handed six-figure salaries, despite dwindling youth participation in its activities and failing to meet government targets.

But Mr Gifford’s salary – which is set by the NCS Trust Remuneration Committee and on which a government representative sits with a veto – has remained at £150,000, or £165,000 including benefits. Other members of the senior leadership also do not appear to have had their salaries cut.

By way of comparison, the CEO of Oxfam received a salary of £120,000, £30,000 less than Mr Giffford, despite managing an annual income more than six times higher than the NCS and a staff of 3,886, 16 times that of the NCS.

Mr Gifford also earned more than Save the Children’s boss, who is on £143,000 and who manages a budget and staff four times larger. The Red Cross CEO earned more, and was paid £181,000, but that is to manage a budget four times the size of NCS and with a headcount 14 times the size.

The National Citizen Service was set up in 2011 by Cameron to run summer and autumn residential programmes for 16 and 17-year-olds to help them become better citizens.

The latest annual accounts reflect that no residentials were held during the year ending March 2022 and that the programme migrated online and to “non-residential face-to-face” experiences.

For the programmes that were held, the NCS failed to meet its basic “customer experience” target score of 55, achieving a disappointing “net promoter score” of 50, according to the annual accounts.

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport last year ripped up the NCS grant, cutting its budget to £57million a year for three years – less than one-third of its size when Cameron had “stuffed NCS’s mouth full of gold”, as one Whitehall whistleblower had put it.

The department criticised the scheme for being too middle-class and demanded it is more “cost-effective” and reach more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. At the time, NCS swallowed up 90 per cent of the government’s youth budget.

A former board member had described the programme to The Independent as little more than “a holiday camp for mostly middle-class kids”.

But Mr Gifford’s salary has remained higher than that of the prime minister and of Lucy Frazer, the culture secretary responsible for the NCS grant, whose salary totals £121,326.

Five of the six other members of the NCS senior leadership team also have packages that exceed the minister’s, according to the latest annual accounts, with NCS public affairs advisor Miriam Jordan Keane on a hefty £155,000.

Her senior leader counterparts at charities such as Oxfam were on £98,000 to £100,000, showing just how excessive NCS senior team salaries are and raising questions as to whether the NCS Remuneration Committee is fit for purpose.

Brett Wigdortz, chair of the NCS Trust, defended their pay arrangements and pointed out that their CEO is responsible for [over] £50m of public money a year for delivering youth programmes.

He said: “We understand the challenges, skills and competencies needed to run NCS and we pay our brilliant CEO accordingly while offering the taxpayer outstanding value for money.”

A spokesperson for the NCS said: “The pay and reward policy of NCS Trust is set by the Remuneration Committee, which has a government representative on it with a veto. It was reviewed in May 2022 and November 2022 by senior HR officers.”

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport declined to address our questions as to whether NCS pay was value for taxpayers’ money but said it had robust processes in place to ensure salary decisions and changes “are proportionate and appropriate”. It added that the NCS has been “carrying out a cost optimisation strategy to reduce and reshape its cost base”.

Shadow culture secretary Lucy Powell MP said: “Ministers should not be playing favourites and the decision by DCMS to seemingly wave through remuneration packages despite reduced budgets without ensuring results and value for money is concerning.

“Ministers are fixating on one programme instead of ensuring the broad range of youth provision we need to open opportunity for young people everywhere.”

Mr Cameron, chair of the NCS Board of Patrons, failed to respond to our questions.