You Cannot Make a Silk Purse out of a Sow's Ear

I refer back to the so-called consultation documents, 'Making a Difference 1 & 2 '', which were woefully lacking in any detail whatsoever, in changes being made to OUR Health Service in Wales and, in particular, the area served by Cardiff and Vale University Health Board.  As a brief reminder; The Midwife-led unit at Llandough was to be immediately transferred to UHW; Rookwood Hospital was to close and its' services being crammed into the top floor of Llandough Hospital, utilising the areas covered by 'women's services', wards, operating theatre, and the Intensive care Unit  ( a.k.a. 'The Silk Purse' ). This was to be achieved by swapping the land and buildings at Rookwood, for the newly vacated top floor of Llandough.  Unfortunately, it is impossible to 'swap' land in this manner as it would be impossible to establish that both properties were of equal value.  Also the Charity Commission would not permit this, nor would it permit the Universally Inept Health Board from making any profit or 'surplus' from the sale of the Rookwood site ( a.k.a. 'The sow's Ear' ). As a result, the move cannot take place until 2014 ( we are informed today ), to give the UIHB time to fiddle various 'Charitable Trusts' of their own making. to enable the charitable trust at Rookwood to become the Health Board's own Charitable Trust, established by them and still, therefore, wholly owned by them. Having trouble following this ?  Trying to explain this disgraceful chicanery by the Directors of the Universally Inept Health Board, would bring tears to a glass eye.

Thusly, we ( the public and patients ) have not been properly consulted with chapter and verse ( meaningful detail and costs ), and have been lied to by this incompetent planning of the Health Board, with the repeated approval of two Health Ministers and our wonderful Welsh Government who, incidentally refer to this 'dog's breakfast' as 'creating a service fit for purpose' ( whatever the hell that means ).  Anyway, after several attempts by the Minister, Leslie Griffiths, to deny the Senyydd ANY explanation whatsover, the 'Dear Lady' is to hold an impressive bash, somewhere in Cardiff, sometime in June, with the title *'The Future of the Health Service in Wales' ( with trumpet voluntary, of course ).  Meanwhile, we still cannot get any details of the new Mental Hospital to be built at Llandough, or how the patients at Whitchurch are to manage over the next four years during which it will be built. Enquiries by AMs and MPs are brushed aside and the written questions from the public are treated with absolute contempt, or left unanswered. Welcome to Wales - the new Banana Republic - except that we're supposed to be a democracy...............aren't we ??????    R.W

* By the way, don't expect to get in free, as the cheapest ticket will be at around £70.00 to keep the riff-raff out !.