The Green Party has slammed the Government a day after Bradford Teaching Hospitals posted on social media that “healthcare services are under extreme pressure” and asked the public “only come to A&E if it is a genuine life / limb-threatening emergency”.
A similar statement was posted on Twitter by Airedale Hospital on New Year’s Eve.
The Green Party in Bradford has condemned the government for failing to tackle issues in the NHS and for seeking to blame NHS workers for long waiting times.
Councillor Matt Edwards, leader of the Green Group on Bradford Council said, “I have been contacted by Bradford residents waiting seven hours to be seen at A&E in Bradford Royal Infirmary and have heard reports of queues of ambulances outside (1). The Tories are allowing the NHS to disintegrate before our eyes.
“But what is really worrying, is that Bradford is not even on the national list of hospitals reporting critical incidents – so there are parts of the country where the situation is far far worse.
“After twelve years of Conservative governments, hospitals in the UK are struggling after such a prolonged period of underinvestment. Thousands of hospital beds have been lost across the country as a result of real cuts in funding.
“Add into the mix the devastating cuts to adult social care that have also meant thousands of beds are being occupied by patients ready to discharge but don’t have a care placement to go to.
“Our country now has some of the least equipped hospitals in Western Europe – the UK has 2.4 hospital beds per 1,000 people. Meanwhile in Germany it’s 7.8 – over three times as many (2). We just can’t carry on like this.”
Greens have also called on the government to end the ongoing pay dispute with the Royal College of Nurses,
Image: Bradford District green Party
Shipley Town Councillor Darren Parkinson (Green Party) who works as a Learning Disability nurse in the NHS said ” I see first-hand the demands that the NHS is under with waiting lists increasing year on year.
“Nurses are struggling with the cost of living due to the real terms pay cut being imposed by the Tory government. I have spoken to my nurse colleagues on the picket line at Bradford Royal Infirmary and I know they are under huge pressure and need the government to invest in the NHS and to pay nurses fairly.
“We are told that a fair pay increase is unaffordable but the government is happy to spend billions on a failed track and trace system, dodgy PPE contracts or tax cuts for the most wealthy, but nurses are told that they don’t deserve a pay rise. This is outrageous.”
In a statement yesterday Professor Phil Banfield, chair of British Medical Association council said (3):
“The current situation in the NHS is intolerable and unsustainable, both for our patients and the hard-working staff desperately trying to keep up with incredibly high levels of demand.
“The BMA has repeatedly invited the Government to sit down and talk about the pressures on our health service, but their silence is deafening. It is disingenuous for the Prime Minister to talk about ‘backing the NHS’ in his New Year message, when his own Health Secretary is failing to discuss how this crisis can be fixed.
“Instead of criticising frontline doctors, nurses and paramedics for wanting to be valued and given the facilities to provide treatment and care, the Government should deliver on its obligations to the public. It is just not true that the cost of resolving this mess cannot be afforded by this country.
“This is a political choice and patients are dying unnecessarily because of that choice.”
