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Is Jeremy Hunt an NHS troll?

“Jeremy Hunt’s latest tweet will have the majority of Britain asking whether the widely-hated Health Secretary is just uncompromisingly incompetent, or whether he’s actively trolling the entire country.

The tweet is so inexplicably inept that it will have the entirety of Britain asking if Hunt is sticking two fingers up at every single doctor and nurse across the country, whilst simultaneously mocking the Prime Minister, who was too weak to sack him during her botched reshuffle, and who ended up giving the provably disastrous Health Secretary even more responsibility instead despite his many, many catastrophic failures.

The Tory Health Secretary just tweeted an NHS rota, in his words, as an example of a ‘really clever use of technology’ that NHS staff in Ipswich are using to ‘ensure safe staffing levels are maintained throughout the day.’

It seems Jeremy Hunt and his team either failed to actually look at what the rota was saying, or they just think dangerously low staffing levels are absolutely fine and definitely not a massive risk to patient safety. Let’s take a closer look at that rota:

Yes, like probably everybody else with even the faintest idea of what different colours mean on a rota, you’ve probably already guessed the problem: RED MEANS BAD!

Every red box on the rota Hunt tweeted means that staffing levels during that particular time of day, and on the corresponding ward, are considered at high risk due to understaffing.

For instance, on the early shift, the rota appears to show there are only two wards in the entire hospital that have adequate staff numbers and therefore a low risk level, whilst a staggering 11 wards have an inadequate number of nurses leading to these wards being labelled ‘high risk’.

It would appear that Hunt either wants to normalise this type of chronic and dangerously risky understaffing, or he simply hasn’t got a clue what the hell he’s doing.

[The article continues with some response tweets pointing this out]

And just remember, the person running the country just gave this man – a man whose professional history is littered with a catalogue of disastrous failures, missed targets and literal deaths as a result of his incredibly obvious incompetence – the task of ‘improving’ social care in Britain as well.

How people can actually justify voting for these people really is beyond me.”

https://evolvepolitics.com/jeremy-hunts-latest-tweet-is-so-outrageously-incompetent-people-think-hes-actually-trolling-nhs-staff/

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Private sector efficiency

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Nurse explains why she has left a beloved profession

“An ”exhausted and despairing ” nurse has written an open letter explaining why she’s quit the NHS – and won’t return until changes are made.

The medic explains why she became a nurse, what she saw, how the NHS is struggling, how she felt after each twelve-hour day and why she’s quit. She also asks the public to be patient and not to blame staff after she read online comments made about doctors and nurses.

She says she was ‘inspired’ to join the medical profession but ”something has changed within the NHS” The nurse says ”…beds have been lost, smaller hospitals have been closed, mental health services have been starved of funding and jobs cut, funding has been cut year on year”.

She adds that ”the numbers of acutely unwell patients coming into the emergency departments is increasing but the services and facilities available to us is declining.”

The nurse says hospitals have ‘no space’ and ”no extra staff to help with the extra work load”. She adds: ”The demand is so much on so few that you are in a position that you are just trying to keep people alive and prevent harm.” She says they have no time to support patients or families and they have no time to offer emotional support and comfort.

She writes: ”You live with a chronic guilt as you cannot provide the care that you want to give every individual, basic tasks like helping someone wash or eat just cannot be done and it pains me to admit that there have been times I have not been able to help someone.”

The anonymous nurse says staff have no time for loo or food breaks and the workload ”has an effect on your own physical and mental health”. She added: Only at the end of your twelve-hour shift when your other nursing colleges take over for the next shift are you able to sit down and do your paper work, meaning having to stay an extra hour or two late (unpaid), you go home exhausted, despairing and listing all the things you haven’t done. You go to bed, wake up and do it all over again.

”The NHS should be the envy of the world but it has been treated so poorly that even with all the will and dedication of all staff involved it is struggling to provide even basic care.”

The letter was written by the nurse to her local paper the Plymouth Herald.”

http://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/despairing-devon-nurse-writes-brutally-1097603

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“Alienated voters ‘don’t feel Brexit will help them retake control’ over decision making”

“The vast majority of British people feel they have little if any control over decisions that affect their lives and the future of the country, a new study has found.

Voters increasingly feel decision making has been taken out of their hands and is being wielded by a remote clique of politicians at national level, it found.

The report, by one of the country’s most senior civil servants, found growing anger over the fact that people do not feel they are being listened to and that their views are frequently ignored.

Lord Kerslake cited the Grenfell fire tragedy as a damning example of what can happen when politicians ignore the demands of people on the ground.

Lord Kerslake told The Telegraph: “We are one of the most over centralised countries in Europe and there is a growing gap between those who are governed and those who govern.

“The terrible tragedy of Grenfell Tower might possibly have been avoided if one of the richest boroughs in the country had listened more to its poorest residents.

“Power can no longer be viewed as belonging to decision-makers a the centre to be ‘given away’. We must find a radical new way to involve people from every community, every street and every home across the country in the decisions that affect them.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/01/21/alienated-voters-dont-feel-brexit-will-help-retake-control-decision/

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“Crown representatives” are directors of other companies and Tory donors

“Labour has warned that the crown representatives who are supposed to police public sector suppliers such as the failed construction company Carillion face potential conflicts of interest, as its own research showed that several hold external directorships and one was a Tory donor.

A dossier produced by the party showed that the former admiral Sir Robert Walmsley, who is responsible to the taxpayer for monitoring the outsourcing multinational Serco, also sits on the board as senior independent director of two defence contractors, Ultra Electronics and Cohort plc.

Daniel Green, the crown representative for the energy sector, is a Conservative donor who has given £330,000 to the party and £15,000 to Theresa May’s successful leadership campaign in 2016. His profile on the LinkedIn network says he is the chief executive of a private equity firm, Liquid Business.

Jon Trickett, the shadow minister for the Cabinet Office, said such relationships amounted to “an astonishing conflict of interest and yet other example of the chumocracy”. Some of the crown representatives, he added “turn out to be people who actually work for companies that have contracts with the government”.

The crown representative system was introduced under the coalition in 2011. They are supposed to work across government on a part-time basis to act as a focal point for key companies or groups of companies who supply the public sector. When a company is in trouble, or deemed high risk, a crown representative is supposed to work with that company to develop an improvement plan.

The system has come into acute focus after Carillion’s liquidation. Julie Scattergood, the crown representative responsible for Carillion, retired last summer and was not replaced until autumn – by then the company had delivered profit warnings in July and September.

Sean Collins, the crown representative for Vodafone and the telecoms infrastructure provider Arqiva, is a non-executive director at JT Group, providing telecoms expertise in the Channel Islands. William Priest, the representative for technology services companies IBM and DXC, is a non-executive director at Connexin, a wireless broadband company.

Carillion collapsed a week ago leaving 28,000 staff facing uncertain futures as the government and private sector companies scrambled to take on its contracts. It had a £900m deficit in its pension fund at the time of collapse and it is unclear if employee pensions can be paid out in full.

The chief secretary to the Treasury, Liz Truss, said on Sunday that the government did not know how much the closure would cost the taxpayer. When Truss was asked on ITV’s Peston on Sunday if it would cost “hundreds of millions”, she said: “Well, it will be a significant amount of money, it’s been a serious issue.”

A government white paper designed to give regulators greater powers to block or place conditions on takeovers that are deemed to put pension schemes at risk is also being drawn up for publication in March.

The Cabinet Office did not respond to a request for comment.”

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jan/21/conflict-of-interests-rampant-in-firms-such-as-carillion-warns-labour

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Next meeting of DCC Health Scrutiny meeting: SOHS suggests action

SOHS suggests the following action following receipt of a letter from Martin Shaw Independent East Devon Alliance Cllr for Seaton and Colyton.

“SOHS:

Please email the councillors on the Devon Adult Care Scrutiny Committee insisting that they discuss this and vote to stop implementation due on 1 April.

sara.randalljohnson@devon.gov.uk
nick.way@devon.gov.uk
hilary.ackland@devon.gov.uk
john.berry@devon.gov.uk
paul.crabb@devon.gov.uk
rufus.gilbert@devon.gov.uk
brian.greenslade@devon.gov.uk
ron.peart@devon.gov.uk
sylvia.russell@devon.gov.uk
philip.sanders@devon.gov.uk
richard.scott@devon.gov.uk
jeff.trail@devon.gov.uk
phil.twiss@devon.gov.uk
carol.whitton@devon.gov.uk
claire.wright@devon.gov.uk
jeremy.yabsley@devon.gov.uk
pdiviani@eastdevon.gov.uk

“Devon’s two Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are pushing ahead with far-reaching, highly controversial changes to the NHS in the County from 1st April – without alerting the public or even the public watchdog, the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee at Devon County Council.

“The changes will turn the Sustainability and Transformation Plan – which itself grew out of the misnamed ‘Success Regime’ which closed our community hospital beds – into a more permanent Devon Accountable Care System. The first phase, in the first part of the financial year 2017-18, will develop integrated delivery systems, with a single ‘strategic commissioner’ for the whole county.

However the real concern is the next phase, which will lead to the establishment of Accountable Care Organisations. These will lead to services being permanently financially constrained, limiting NHS patients’ options for non-acute conditions, and pushing better-off patients even more towards private practice.

“Large chunks of our NHS will be contracted out for long periods, probably to private providers. The ‘toolkit’ for this fundamental change talks about ensuring ‘that there are alternative providers available in the event of provider failure’. In the aftermath of Carillion, do we really want most of our NHS contracted out to private firms?

“Devon’s public are not being consulted about this change – unlike in Cornwall where the Council has launched a public consultation – and there is no reason to believe that they want a privatised, two-tier health system.
“Devon’s CCGs have pushed the change through without publicity, and it is only because I have put it on the agenda that Health Scrutiny will have a chance to discuss in advance of April 1st. I have written a 7-page paper for the Committee outlining what we know about the ACS and posing eight questions which they should ask about it.”

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Remember “the mixed economy”? Is “the left” the new centre?

A comment on an Observer article:

“When I was a lad we had a thing called the “mixed economy”. Remember that, the “mixed economy”? It was a litmus test of political reasonableness – if you didn’t believe in the mixed economy you were a Communist, if you did you were a socialist (or else you might just be a Tory).

Even Hugh Gaitskell and Harold Wilson and Anthony Crosland and Denis Healey believed in the mixed economy.

The mixed economy was a safety net. If there was important stuff that the market economy couldn’t deliver, the public sector would do it. If some things seemed too important to be exposed to the risk of market failure, there could be public provision. If neither of those things applied the market could have it.

The Labour Party’s new slogan “No-one left behind” sums it up beautifully for me. We can’t control what the global economy may throw at us, but we can at least agree to stick together and pool our resources.

What we urgently need to face up to is that there IS no mixed economy any more, it is all market-driven. The idea that the government somehow controls it all is fraudulent.

WE don’t build houses, the private sector does, occasionally. Local councils used to have Direct Labour Organisations that actually built houses, but not any more. WE don’t generate electricity any more – we have a system for bribing the private sector to do it. Our water supplies are all controlled from abroad. Our schools system is being franchised out. We taught the world how to build railways, but now we don’t own ours. Accidentally we had to take part of the railway network back into public control, and the results were embarrassingly good.

Of course there are still islands of “backwardness” – the National Health Service, especially the NHS in Wales and Scotland. The BBC, bits of the Post Office. But they are being “modernised” and “streamlined” and “reformed”, don’t you worry. What the Tories can’t loot directly, they disrupt and undermine and demoralise.

So much has been taken away from us. Or … we have GIVEN so much away. Which way you choose to see that is really important – are we powerless or not?

So we cannot afford to let the party and the country move any further to the right, because they already moved too far to the right. If we move to the left we will still probably be to the right of where we used to be. Many people still remember what things used to be like in this country and are receptive to that type of argument.

If we have to be called revolutionaries just because we want a mixed economy, then so be it.”

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jan/21/capitalism-new-crisis-can-private-sector-be-trusted-carillion-privatisation?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

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Top construction companies not accepting fixed-price PFI deals

The new NHS Accountable Care Organisations are relying on fixed-price PFI contracts for their savings.

“Bosses of top construction and outsourcing companies have warned ministers they will no longer accept fixed-price PFI deals after the collapse of Carillion.

The threat is a blow to the government’s £600bn infrastructure programme, which is already struggling to attract bidders. Last week the National Audit Office said there was little evidence that private finance initiative deals offered value for money for taxpayers.

Carillion plunged into insolvency last week with just £29m cash in the bank. Its threadbare finances were undone by failings on a string of PFI contracts, which left it unable to access hundreds of millions of pounds.

Balfour Beatty, Britain’s biggest construction company, has been moving away from fixed-price PFI contracts, which leave the winning bidders vulnerable to big losses if the projects encounter unexpected problems. The £2bn company is emerging from a disastrous spell of contract problems, which led to seven profit warnings.

Galliford Try — Carillion and Balfour Beatty’s partner on the Aberdeen bypass PFI contract — is also refusing to consider new fixed-price deals.

Rupert Soames, chief executive of the outsourcing giant Serco, said contractors would refuse to bid if too much risk were piled on them.

“Government would say, ‘You signed the bloody contract.’ But it’s not in anyone’s interest if you consistently get suppliers making huge losses. That’s no way to encourage a vibrant market. Both sides need to learn lessons from this,” said Soames, whose company’s government contracts include running prisons.

Balfour Beatty said in a report: “We need to move away from the position where fixed-price contracts, risk transfer, lowest-cost tendering and adversarial relationships are the norm.”

Carillion’s crisis was exposed in July when it admitted that contracts to build the bypass, Birmingham’s Midland Metropolitan Hospital and the Royal Liverpool Hospital were to blame for a large chunk of an £845m writedown. All three deals were public-private contracts, which left Carillion to foot the bill for cost overruns. There were unexpected problems in Aberdeen and Liverpool.

Despite this, the government wants contractors to bear all the risk on two huge PFI projects: a £1.6bn tunnel to bypass Stonehenge in Wiltshire and the £1bn Silvertown tunnel in east London.

Stephen Rawlinson of the analyst Applied Value, said: “The government has become more and more of a bully and transferred risk that the private sector cannot cope with.”

● Richard Adam, Carillion’s former finance chief, has quit the board of the warship designer BMT. Adam, 60, oversaw a huge expansion in debt at Carillion before his departure at the end of 2016. He joined BMT only eight months ago. He has recently left the boards of the developer Countryside, estate agent Countrywide and transport company First Group.”

Source: Sunday Times (pay wall)

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“Hobson’s choice cut or cut?” says East Devon Alliance councillor Cathy Gardner

“East Devon’s MP wrote a column for the Sidmouth Herald (“View from Westminster”, 12 Jan 2018) saying that that as a District Councillor I “will be tested” by “funding pressures”. I am indeed very unhappy about the cuts made to all public services due to the “choice” made by this government to pursue austerity. We should consider why our representative in Parliament has always made the “choice” to vote with the government on austerity cuts while publicly speaking out against bed cuts in London (Brompton Hospital), not East Devon.”

[see here:
https://eastdevonwatch.org/2017/08/05/more-on-swire-saving-services-at-royal-brompton-hospital-london/
and here
https://eastdevonwatch.org/2017/12/03/swire-fails-to-save-another-hospital/

“All Councils have had their government funding drastically reduced. There is no sign that this funding will ever return, leaving our infrastructure to deteriorate. EDDCs controlling party made a “choice” not to increase council tax for five years and proudly crowed about it, thus reducing the amount available in the coffers to help fund services now.

EDDC are looking at ways to cut even more and I will be asking for essential services like free and unrestricted access to public toilets to be protected over things like art galleries. Don’t get me wrong, I would prefer not to cut anything at all, but public toilets are a public health matter and must be defended. Youth services should also be prioritised as money spent there tends to be saved elsewhere in the system. These are the “choices” that the District Council faces. We will see what the controlling Conservative group chose to prioritise when the budget is approved at the end of February.
Cllr Cathy Gardner, East Devon Alliance and ward member for Sidmouth town

Source: East Devon Alliance Facebook page posted today

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Is it ok for ex-Ministers to work for Chinese? They think so

“The Mail on Sunday leads with what it calls the “political storm” caused by the secret filming of three ex-Tory ministers by Channel Four’s Dispatches programme.

An undercover reporter posed as a representative of Chinese millionaires, offering to pay for advice from Andrew Lansley, Andrew Mitchell, and Peter Lilley about how to make money from Brexit.

All three have denied any wrongdoing, with Mr Lilley calling it “a tawdry attempt at entrapment.”

Writing in the Mail on Sunday, ex-chief whip Andrew Mitchell has strenuously denied any wrongdoing, saying he was the victim of “attempted entrapment” and is “totally innocent”, and that it is not against parliamentary rules for an MP to have a second job.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-42763230

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Council 2018-2019 budget – many elephants in the room!

Recent comment on “pay to pee” article (below):

“Notice the contradiction here: one councillor says the idea is not being looked at, another group of councillors say town and … [quote from original article]

Might I suggest that there is fake news (or misdirection).

Instead of concentrating on the big savings – the biggest costs/budgets under management, we are being misdirected to something we actually understand (don’t forget the seaside towns are over endowed with the elderly, whose needs include lavatories) so that we can gain a small ‘win’ by demanding the facilities, so that we forget the elephants in the room. And there are several of them.

A gallery that only Councillor’s want.
A move of headquarters that only Councillors want.
A drastic reduction in healthcare services, that only Councillors want.
Seafront developments that only Councillors want.

William of Occam would say I have over-made the point.

Do you suppose there is a picture developing here?

I could add the absolutely fantastic budget demand coming from a Police body that has a management cost out of all proportion to its actual size. You could make significant savings by firing the bosses and not lose any quality of service?

And what about getting rid of the LLP [LEP] which, in my view, has achieved precisely nothing since it was created (except increase the salaries of the leaders although they have yet to achieve any results). That would make some tidy savings.

Maybe we can afford a health service after all!”

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Hunt asked to pause Accountable Care Organisations – but will he?

“Thank you for signing the petition STOP the new plans to dismantle our NHS, please share this!

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-the-plans-to-dismantle-our-nhs

Great news! Sarah Wollaston MP, Chair of the Health Committee has written to Jeremy Hunt asking him to “delay the introduction of the new contract for Accountable Care Organisations until after the Health Committee has taken the opportunity to hear evidence on the issues around the introduction of accountable care models to the NHS”

People are beginning to wake up to the possibility that the NHS is about to be privatised and are not happy about it. Has something worried Sarah Wollaston enough to take this step?

The Judge giving permission for the 999 Call for the NHS into the lawfulness of the Accountable Care Organisation contract to be heard and setting capped costs because of the importance and huge public interest, gave us all a sense of hope. Their case is due to be heard in Leeds in April and they are still crowdfunding for that.

The doctors and academic’s Judicial Review with regard to lack of public consultation and Parliamentary scrutiny which was joined by physicist Stephen Hawking created more publicity.

Now this news published today (Friday). We believe Accountable Care Organisations have huge implications for patients.

Let’s share the petition and make it huge. Together we can win this.”

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-the-plans-to-dismantle-our-nhs

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Greendale Business Park lose legal case for Planning Approval

Press release from Councillor Geoff Jung, East Devon Alliance Independent, Raleigh Ward:

“”In a recent Planning Application, the owners of Greendale Business Park claimed that because an agricultural field has been used for open industrial storage for more than ten years they were entitled to continue that use under a little used clause in the Town and Country Planning Act, known as a “Certificate of Lawfulness”.

However, the Act stipulates it is not the length of use, but the length of a “breach in planning control”. As Laing Utilities occupied this area in association with the laying of the gas pipeline between 2006 and July 2009 and Utility companies are permitted to occupy and use locations as depots for the construction of pipelines or cables the use up to July 2009 could not be claimed to be a breach in planning control.

East Devon District Council as the (LPA) Local Planning Authority had to take legal advice and concluded that the company had not been able to demonstrate that there has been a “Breach of Planning Control for 10 years” and therefore the Application 17/2441/CPE has been refused.
Company can Appeal

The applicant however is entitled to appeal to the Secretary of State within six months of the notification of the refusal.

Enforcement Notice

The Report by East Devon District Council recommends that an Enforcement Notice is served requiring the owners to:

1. Permanently cease the use of the area shown on the plan for the storage of items not connected with agriculture and remove any such items
2. Permanently remove the perimeter and internal fencing and all hardstanding
3. Permanently remove the concrete, hardcore and drainage used to construct the
entrances.
4. Permanently remove all debris and paraphernalia from the area outlined in Red and return this site to an agricultural field clear of such items.

Location of are to be returned to agricultural use outlined in red above.

Greendale Extension East

This Planning Refusal comes only a month after another case at Greendale Business Park had an Enforcement Appeal upheld by the Secretary of State. This was after a Planning Appeal Inspector agreed with the Local Authority and again required the site to be removed of all industrial activities and returned to agricultural use. (Planning Application 15/2592/MOUT).

The Owners of Greendale have now appealed to the High Court for a Judicial Review on this Enforcement Appeal.

Retrospective Planning Applications.

Both cases were the result of the owners of Greendale constructing concrete roads and yards together with security fencing, drainage, lighting and industrial buildings prior to planning permission being obtained. This is known as Retrospective Planning Permission

Village Plan

The Woodbury Salterton Residents Association, a group of residents in the small rural village next to the business park have campaigned for more clarity and a clear understanding on a defined area where Industrial use and employment is permitted and what is classed as “open countryside.”

For 5 years the team of local people have worked tirelessly, working with local Parish Councils, District Councillors and the Planning Authorities to put a halt on the unplanned unlawful development at the Business Park.

The Local Development Plan approved in January 2016 gave some guidance and clarity and the recent unsuccessful application on Hogsbrook Hill and the extension East of the main Business Park are the result of following the guidance and principles laid down in the Local Plan and the National Planning Policy Framework.

However, the local plan stated that a further planning document will follow on from the Local Plan known as the “Villages Plan” giving further guidance and clarity to the 14 largest villages in East Devon and the business parks of Greendale and Hill Barton.

This document is very nearly to the stage of adoption, with 2 public consultations and a public hearing by the Planning Inspectorate.

The final draft was submitted in December for a final public consultation with the final date for people to have a say the 2nd February.

East Devon Alliance Independent Councillor Geoff Jung, who is the Councillor for Raleigh Ward which includes the village of Woodbury Salterton and Greendale Business Park says:

“I have worked with the Planning Policy Department officers and all other Councillors at East Devon District Council and attended every Council meeting when the Village Plan has been debated and attended the public hearings. This has been to ensure that the Village Plan and especially the guidance and controls on these 2 Business Parks went through correctly and democratically.

The Planning Inspector’s proposals for the Business Parks will provide the owners of the business parks, residents and the planning authority absolute certainty of where development will be permitted and where planning will be refused.

However, at the very last Council meeting in December an amendment to remove all mention of the business parks in the Villages Plan was proposed – this was rejected but is still supported by some District Councillors. Any changes to the Inspector’s recommendation would add ambiguity and loopholes to the planning process. I would encourage all interested parties to contact the local planning with their views by the 2nd Feb.

Email: planningpolicy@eastdevon.gov.uk
These views will be sent on to the inspector.

The following Hyperlink takes you to the EDDC Villages Plan Page
EDDC Villages Plan Consultation:

http://eastdevon.gov.uk/planning/planning-policy/villages-plan/villages-plan-2017/villages-plan-examination/

I would like to thank the Planning Inspector Mrs Beverley Doward BSc BTP MRTPI and the East Devon team in the Planning Policy Department for a Villages Plan that will help many communities in East Devon.”

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“LANDLORD FORCING TENANTS TO PAY FOR REMOVAL OF FLAMMABLE CLADDING IS A SUPER RICH TORY DONOR”

“The Guardian has published a rip-roaring story about wealthy landlord who’s trying to get his tenants to pay for fire safety improvements needed to avoid a repeat of the Grenfell tragedy – but they’ve missed one important detail.

It reveals how the owners of a block of flats in Croydon have refused to remove and replace flammable cladding on the building until the tenants stump up the £2 million cost of the work.

That amounts to a charge of £31,300 per flat – more than a year’s salary for many of the tenants who say they are “terrified” about the cladding since Grenfell.

The owner of the block of 93 flats is Proxima GR Properties, which the Guardian points out is “owned by the family trust of the multi-millionaire property mogul Vincent Tchenguiz.”

It notes that Tchenguiz is: “Believed to be worth hundreds of millions of pounds and last year bought a new 165-foot superyacht moored in the Mediterranean called Da Vinci. He is said to own 300,000 freeholds in the UK, including 10 Hilton hotels.”

On top of all that, Scrapbook can reveal that Tchenguiz is also a Tory donor – he gave the party more than £21,000 before the 2010 general election.

His brother, Robert, has also given the Tories a five figure sum and his sister, Elizabeth, made a donation of £100,000 in 2008.

Presumably that means Vincent Tchenguiz’s contact details are hanging around Tory HQ somewhere.

So Sajid Javid should have no problem in getting in touch to sort out this absolute scandal.

If you’ve got enough money to throw some of it at the Tories, you’ve got enough money to keep your tenants safe… “

https://politicalscrapbook.net/2018/01/landlord-forcing-tenants-to-pay-for-removal-of-flammable-cladding-is-a-super-rich-tory-donor/

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PFI contracts – windfall tax them says Labour MP who says companies are “legal loan sharks”

Labour MP Stella Creasy on Today programme this morning:

“What the NAO reports shows, to devastating effect, is that PFI and PF2, because the government brought in exactly the same scheme under a different name, is both too expensive to continue on with and very expensive to get out of.

Of that £10bn [the annual charge for PFI contracts] what that study also shows is that half of that is interest on charges. These companies, these type of contracts, really are the legal loan sharks of the public sector. It’s like a payday loan or a hire purchase agreement to build a school or a hospital and then run one. It’s a very expensive way to do it. And the question we all have to ask ourselves is what do we do next.

This is why I’m calling for a windfall tax on these companies. The one place where we do have leverage with them is on the tax they pay. They’ve also had a massive corporation tax bonus because corporation tax on a lot of these contracts [when they] were signed, and it was part of the deal and the reason why we went with them, was around 30%. Under this government it has now dropped to 17%. So we are estimating that some of them have saved around £190m in corporation tax payments alone. That is money that is owed to our public sector, and is money we could get back with a windfall tax.”

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Accountability, Hinkley C, Privatisation, Scrutiny, Sleaze

“Disgraced Carillion chief now director of firm in charge of inspections at Hinkley Point C nuclear power station”

“Carillion – the firm handed millions in contracts by the Tories – has just gone into liquidation leaving thousands of employees and small businesses facing bankruptcy and redundancy.

In July last year, the man responsible for the debacle – incompetent former Group Chief Executive of Carillion Richard Howson – stood down and seemingly disappeared on the same day the company’s disastrous finances were revealed.

But only after paying himself £1.5 million in pay and tens of thousands in bonuses and perks and leaving the firm with a massive £800 million pension deficit and debts of £1.4 billion of course:

So where is Howson now?

Locked up in a monastery somewhere, contemplating his failures and atoning for his sins?

Surprise surprise.

Here he is, hidden away as a new director of engineering and technical services company Wood Group:

https://www.woodplc.com/investors/the-board

Wood Group has just won a lucrative contract to carry out inspections at the UK government’s new Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant:

https://www.woodplc.com/news/press-releases/2017/wood-wins-hinkley-point-c-contract-worth-$16m

https://tompride.wordpress.com/2018/01/15/disgraced-carillion-chief-now-director-of-firm-in-charge-of-inspections-at-hinkley-point-c-nuclear-power-station/

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Accountability, Accountable Care Organisation, DCC, East Devon Alliance, Health and Social Care (local), Martin Shaw (Seaton), NHS (local)

EDA Councillor Martin Shaw on the next threat to our local NHS

PRESS RELEASE:

“Devon’s two Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are pushing ahead with far-reaching, highly controversial changes to the NHS in the County from 1st April – without alerting the public or even the public watchdog, the Health and Adult Care Scrutiny Committee at Devon County Council.

The changes will turn the Sustainability and Transformation Plan – which itself grew out of the misnamed ‘Success Regime’ which closed our community hospital beds – into a more permanent Devon Accountable Care System. The first phase, in the first part of the financial year 2017-18, will develop integrated delivery systems, with a single ‘strategic commissioner’ for the whole county.

However the real concern is the next phase, which will lead to the establishment of Accountable Care Organisations. These will lead to services being permanently financially constrained, limiting NHS patients’ options for non-acute conditions, and pushing better-off patients even more towards private practice.

Large chunks of our NHS will be contracted out for long periods, probably to private providers. The ‘toolkit’ for this fundamental change talks about ensuring ‘that there are alternative providers available in the event of provider failure’. In the aftermath of Carillion, do we really want most of our NHS contracted out to private firms?

Devon’s public are not being consulted about this change – unlike in Cornwall where the Council has launched a public consultation – and there is no reason to believe that they want a privatised, two-tier health system.

Devon’s CCGs have pushed the change through without publicity, and it is only because I have put it on the agenda that Health Scrutiny will have a chance to discuss in advance of April 1st. I have written a 7-page paper for the Committee outlining what we know about the ACS and posing eight questions which they should ask about it.

Martin Shaw
Independent East Devon Alliance County Councillor for Seaton & Colyton”

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“Taxpayers to foot £200bn bill for PFI contracts – audit office”

“Cost of privately financing projects ‘can be 40% higher’ than using public money

Taxpayers will be forced to hand over nearly £200bn to contractors under private finance deals for at least 25 years, according to a report by Whitehall’s spending watchdog.

In the wake of the collapse of public service provider Carillion, the National Audit Office found little evidence that government investment in more than 700 existing public-private projects has delivered financial benefits.

The cost of privately financing public projects can be 40% higher than relying solely upon government money, auditors found.

They also disclosed that the government has a £35m equity stake in one of Carillion’s major projects – public money that is now at risk. …

There are currently 716 operational private finance deals with a capital value of around £60bn, the report said.

Annual charges for these deals amounted to £10.3bn in 2016-17. Even if no new deals are entered into, future charges that continue until the 2040s amount to £199bn, it said – money that could finance the entire NHS for 20 months. …

“After 25 years of PFI, there is still little evidence that it delivers enough benefit to offset the additional costs of borrowing money privately,” she said. “Many local bodies are now shackled to inflexible PFI contracts that are exorbitantly expensive to change.

“I am concerned that [the] treasury has relaunched PFI under new branding, without doing anything about most of its underlying problems. We need more investment in our schools and hospitals but if we get the contracts wrong, taxpayers pay the price,” she said.

Research by auditors found that private investors who charge public bodies for insurance on each project, have not passed on 15 years of lower insurance costs.

“Public bodies are paying more for insurance than the actual cost, providing a gain to [private] investors,” it said. …”

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jan/18/taxpayers-to-foot-200bn-bill-for-pfi-contracts-audit-office

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Accountability, Police (local)

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Police and Crime Commissioner wants our opinion on raising police precept

Sadly, she doesn’t want our opinion on the vast sum of money wasted on her and her employees which appears to be somewhere between more £1 million and up to £3 m depending on where you look (Owl is not an accountant) – with, of course, more staff to help her.

Click to access STA_REP_statement-of-account-YE-31.03.17_170929.pdf

(pages 12, 24 and 26)

“The Police and Crime Commissioner Alison Hernandez invites you to take part in a survey about increasing the precept for police funding in your area. Please click on the attached link to take part.

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/G2S8QP7

Thank you.
Message Sent By
Natasha Radford (Police, Community Messaging Officer, Devon and Cornwall)”

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Accountability, Hugo Swire, Inequality

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Swire this week: wants less tax on internal flights and less (or no) VAT for “historic building” repairs!

Is he flying from London City Airport to Exeter these days and does he live in a “historic building” in mid-Devon? Bet a lot of his mates live in historic buildings – aka stately homes or Grade 1 mansions in London!

How about a bit if work on stratospheric local rail fare increases or perhaps a little thought about those of his “just about managing” constituents who are not able to afford basic (full VAT) repairs to their very ordinary homes?

Oral Answers to Questions – Treasury: Air Passenger Duty (16 Jan 2018)
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2018-01-16a.707.0&s=speaker%3A11265#g707.3

“Hugo Swire: May I congratulate my hon. Friend on his appointment? He has done extremely well. Airlines such as Flybe, which is based at Exeter airport in my constituency, undertake a disproportionate amount of domestic flights. As my hon. Friend will be aware, domestic flights, unlike international ones, are currently hit twice by APD—at both take-off and landing. Treasury officials, of course,…”

Oral Answers to Questions – Treasury: Topical Questions (16 Jan 2018)
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2018-01-16a.719.6&s=speaker%3A11265#g720.6

“Hugo Swire: The cost of the backlog of repairs to our historic buildings is now estimated to stand at an alarming £1.3 billion, in large part because of the changes to VAT levied on repairs. Will my right hon.
Friend show that, as a Conservative, he genuinely believes in conservation and that something will be left standing for future generations to enjoy?”