Why the refusal of East London Health & Care Partnership to back claims that King George A&E safe matters

Email sent to Redbridge Cllrs earlier this evening

Dear Mark and Redbridge Councillors

1 No endorsement from ELHCP

For the statement to be unequivocal about King George A&E being safe, the East London Health & Care Partnership (ELHCP), who make the major decisions about what happens at King George, need to issue a press release confirming the BHRUT statement on their website today by 6pm for the BHRUT statement to have credibility.

Not only that, but the ELHCP need to make several amendments to their Estates Strategy Plan to say King George A&E is now safe. For example at page 15  http://eastlondonhcp.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/STRATEGIC-ESTATES-PLAN-summary.pdf where no A&E at King George is given as an option. The Estates Strategy Plan determines the future of King George A&E, not a press release signed by three Council leaders and some local NHS managers on a Labour party website late on a Friday afternoon.

Also contrary to the BHRUT press release saying King George A&E is safe, Page 7 of the BHRUT  https://www.bhrhospitals.nhs.uk/clinical-services-strategy says King George A&E is to close. This is 2016 document, but it is the one BHRUT are working to now.

So, unless the ELHCP back up BHRUT and BHRUT amend their clinical services strategy by 6pm today it will be clear that the statement signed by three Council Leaders is just public relations spin to prevent the BBC news covering the campaign to stop the new plan to close King George A&E.

The BBC news desk management saw through the spin and published the story, I encourage Councillors to see through the spin too.

2) Leaked Document points to another step to KGH A&E closure

On Saturday, I was given a document at https://twitter.com/Andywalker1945/status/1112069527624392709 which appears to say a reconfiguration is taking place at King George now, despite a review meant to be ongoing. As yet, BHRUT is not answering my questions about the document. However it appears, and I stress appears, until conformation takes place, that Holly ward has been downgraded and is no longer an acute ward. This may be important because if the downgrade is to a community ward taking only planned admissions then emergency admissions capacity has been reduced at King George Hospital. This is another step to closing King George A&E. As yet BHRUT have not disclosed any information about the leaked document.

In the past BHRUT used to supply me with acute & general beds for emergency admissions at King George and Queens, critical bed occupancy and excess deaths rates for each hospital. This suppressing of information makes it more difficult for elected representatives and the public to know whether bed cuts at King George are leading to increased death rates at Queens due to too much pressure being put onto Queens. 

3) 10 Downing Street visit - do you want to lobby for the suppressed bid to be made public?

The campaign hope to get six people along to 10 Downing Street to hand in a letter to say the £49M failed "reconfigeration" bid needs to be disclosed for reasons outlined in earlier emails. On Saturday Cllr David Edgar joined with Cllr Dodin, Keith Prince AM & Wes Streeting MP to say the suppressed document needs to be published in full along with the distribution list.

For the avoidance of any doubt, supporting the publication of the bid does not mean that any of the elected representatives who are in favour of bid publication support my claims of a cover up to of a new plan to close King George A&E. 

My apologies to Cllr Santos, I misinterpreted an earlier email of his to say he was in favour of the suppressed document being published. I expect we will  go for a date at 10 Downing Street with enough time to build up support so we can get a good crowd along to encourage the TV news to attend. Do let me know if you would like to attend.

Regards

Andy

07956 263088

Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android

On Mon, 1 Apr 2019 at 13:25, Cllr Mark Santos

<mark.santos@redbridge.gov.uk> wrote:

Peter,

I don't share your interpretation of the statement.  It is unequivocal.  I and Redbridge Council will be focusing on the development of the new/refreshed clinical strategy as this is what will determine the future of services at KGH.

We need to ensure people are engaged with this process and don't lose this opportunity.

With best wishes

Mark