Finance Minister's Budget Exposes NHS Lies

Dear Jane Hutt has finally proved that for over two years the Health Ministers - The Queen of Harts and Lesley Griffiths  have lied about the Making a Difference plan that was put out for consultation and given the seal of approval by the equally dishonest, and totally useless, Community Health Council.  For over two years, Deputy Director Paul Hollard - aided and abetted by fellow Director Katie Norton - stated theat the new mental health hospital proposed for Llandough site was guaranteed to be built for £80m.  As has become the norm, the consultation was a complete farce that completely ignored the views of the public and the self-evident facts that me and my colleagues had brought to the attention of The entire Universally Inept Health Board, the Directors/ Mandarins of NHS Wales and, of course both inept Ministers. Firstly, the somnambulent, dictatorial Edwina, Queen of Harts and then the inept novice, Lesley Griffiths changed the consultation guidelines, arbitarily, and subsequently refused to ignore our list of points in the guidelines that had been totally ignored by the U.I.H.B.and the NHS Lapdogs, the Community Health Council.  All the written responses from the NHS and our Government said that the consultation was fair and that the guidelines were followed to the letter by the UHIB and the C.H.C. - all blatant lies that sought to bully their critics ( me and my colleagues ) into submission, without success.

Now we find that 'Making a Difference' was a deceitful ruse to dupe the ( supposedly ) ignorant and uncaring patients and the public - thanks to the first Health Minister, now promoted to Finance Minister.  Her budget reveals that there is £30m set aside for hospitals, specifically, the new Mental Health hospital at Llandough AND including £18m for the redevelopment of Morriston hospital. This leaves a mere £12m for new mental; health units at Llandough hospital and Glanfryd hospital at Bridgend.  Great, isn't it ? A phoney consultation with phoney lies, created by the Planning Director and Deputy Chief Executive of the Cardiff and Vale Universally Inept Health Board, Paul Hollard ( £180,000pa min ).  When the change was made from a 104 bed unit at Whitchurch at £80m ( £769,000 per bed ), I wrote a report that pointed out the the Llanfair unit - 57 beds - cost only £7.155m ( £125,000 per bed ), highlighting how ridiculous the £80m figure was, in fact. Despite this observation, both Hollard and Norton stated at every consultation meeting, and presentation to the 'Duffers' of the CHC, that the cost of the Mental Hospital at Llandough, alone, would cost £80 which they assured everybody had been ring-fenced by the ( then ) Welsh Assembly Government and the Queen of Harts. Then, only yesterday, the General Manager of Llandough stated ( in the Echo ) that the new mental health inpatient unit would have 135 beds ( that's £88,000 per bed ).

Wheras this all may be rather boring to you, it does prove - beyond any doubt - the complete dishonesty of our government, NHS Wales, the U.I.H.B, and the CHCs.  Therefore, we may appear to be ignorant Plebians, those in authority are all even more incompetent than we could imagine. I must just add that I sent a copy of my report to 35 senior officials referred to above, without a single, solitary acknowledgement or intelligent reply.  Everyone of these incompetent and over-paid bureaucrats ( including Health Economist, Professor Marcus Longley ) are perfect examples of the Peter Principal or, as a dear friend put it, "The higher up the tree the monkey climbs, the more it shows its arse". With no apologies, R.W.