Letters: A bonfire of NHS bureaucracy would free up funding for front-line staff
SIR – Nurses deserve fair pay (Letters, December 16). No question. But taxpaying patients also deserve high-quality care.
It should be possible to achieve both with the NHS’s massive budget. However, this will require the NHS to confront some major problems.
It is a huge, fragmented organisation, wasteful and inefficient, with layers of self-interested managers and administrators. It requires a total overhaul, stripping out any and all activity that adds no direct, measurable value to patient care.
NHS bosses need to grasp the fact that they are the ones who (with support from the Government) have a duty to resolve this problem, so that better salaries can be offered to front-line staff.
Rob Mason
Nailsea, Somerset
SIR – Amanda Pritchard is the CEO of NHS England.
We rarely hear from her. Why isn’t she being held to account for the numerous problems in her organisation?
Kathryn Martin
Olney, Buckinghamshire
SIR – The Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust is currently advertising for a Director for Lived Experience at a salary of £110,000 to £115,000 per year.
How can the NHS be unable to afford the nurses’ pay demands?
David Garnett
Northwich, Cheshire
SIR – As a medical practitioner I have great sympathy for the striking NHS workers, although I am uncomfortable with the notion of healthcare professionals withdrawing their labour. I didn’t stop working when the British Medical Association called a strike of NHS consultants: it didn’t seem quite right.
What really angers me is the way the Government keeps referring to the sacred judgment of the pay review bodies. For years the doctors’ and dentists’ pay review body made recommendations that were ignored. Sometimes the Government would interfere by telling the supposedly independent body what the limitations of its recommendations were.
The Government speaks with a forked tongue: it accepts the findings of these bodies only when it suits.
Furthermore, the current mess is entirely of the Government’s making. How a Conservative government came to believe that printing money would lead to anything but a general reduction in wealth and runaway inflation is beyond all comprehension.
Dr Nicholas Mark Hacking
Preston, Lancashire
SIR – Is it time to start a patients’ union?
Duncan Reeves
Lindfield, West Sussex
Lockdown lessons
SIR – Fraser Nelson’s article on the lessons of lockdown (Comment, December 16) chimes with me.
He correctly highlights the unreliable science and the lack of scrutiny. I would add to his observations. Why were there no cost-benefit analyses done using standard methodology? Why was the nation “nudged” and constantly fed worst-case scenarios, which often left out positive data? Why was the Great Barrington Declaration consigned so quickly to the bin? Why were the doomsters allowed to take control?
As with this country’s abysmal failure on energy policy, we need to ask what went wrong with our decision-making processes and what we can do to put things right. This is not a witch hunt; it is imperative that we improve what we do.
Stuart Moore
Bramham, West Yorkshire
EU in disgrace
SIR – What a brilliantly refreshing article by Alan Sked (“The EU has never looked more bankrupt”, Comment, December 15).
But why don’t we hear this from our elected politicians?
Philip A Truett
Walton-on-the-Hill, Surrey
SIR – Alan Sked perpetuates the myth that the EU is made up of “unelected foreign bureaucrats”, ignoring the elected parliament and the council of ministers
It is an elected MEP accused of accepting bribes and exercising undue influence; such actions are clearly wrong, but the case is being dealt with robustly by the Belgian police, as well as the European parliament. The parliament vice president involved has already been sacked.
Indeed, perhaps our police and parliamentary authorities could learn something from the Belgians and EU.
Roy Perry
Wellow, Somerset
Saga of the Sussexes
SIR – The Duke and Duchess of Sussex (Letters, December 16) appear not to understand that no one person or couple in the Royal family is bigger than the concept of the Crown in a constitutional monarchy.
The late Queen Elizabeth II understood this, which was why her long reign was so successful.
Notwithstanding the challenges ahead, I am sure our new King will demonstrate Christian forgiveness. Let us hope they can all draw a line under this matter and move on.
Iain D Bailey
London SE16
Year-round delight from a Christmas poinsettia
SIR – Last Christmas I was given a beautiful poinsettia. I understood that, in order to encourage this plant to produce red bracts the following year, it was necessary to keep it in the dark for three months.
Instead, in spring I planted mine in the garden, where it produced healthy green foliage all summer. In October I brought it indoors – and the bright red bracts appeared naturally.
Dorothy Lee
Thaxted, Essex
SIR – The letter (December 16) on festive breakfasts reminded me of my late mother, whose treat in December was brandy butter on her toast. Despite my misgivings, I found it to be curiously addictive.
She was a person of sober habits, though I did wonder when watching her prepare her morning coffee: half a mug of coffee, topped up with a well-known Irish cream liqueur. She said it set her up for the day – and it worked, as she lived to 92.
David Chinn
Staines, Surrey
SIR – The feature (December 16) on hangover cures missed my own tried-and-tested remedy – a bowl of hot broth with some small-sized pasta and grated Parmesan cheese. This can be taken before bed or the morning after. The prescription can be improved by the inclusion of homemade ravioli and my mother saying, “I told you not to drink so much”, in an Italian accent.
G F Orsi
Pontypridd, Glamorgan
SIR – I have just received a Christmas card (Letters, December 14) posted from Bath on November 25.
To my reckoning, that is an average door-to-door speed of 0.2 mph – the same as a Galápagos tortoise.
Ros Groves
Watford, Hertfordshire
SIR – I have lived at my house for 22 years and every Christmas I receive a card from the same family, addressed to the previous owners.
Simon Down
Ipswich, Suffolk
Bishops and migrants
SIR – Following the Archbishop of Canterbury’s pronouncements on the illegal Channel crossings, I listened incredulously to the Bishop of Dover on Thursday’s Today programme.
The Bishop spoke of families desperate to escape persecution, war, famine or oppressive regimes. This country has a justifiably proud record of welcoming such individuals.
Do church leaders not read the statistics released by the Government detailing the origins of those crossing in small boats? The overwhelming majority currently risking their lives are from Albania, and are single men.
I am a practising Christian, and recognise the need to help less fortunate individuals. But the Church needs to acknowledge that, for every pound spent on policing, processing and housing illegal migrants, there is less to spend on supporting genuine refugees.
Stephen Howey
Woodford Green, Essex
Failed by British Gas
SIR – I too have fallen foul of the British Gas HomeCare cover (report, December 16).
I had a paid subscription for years and eventually asked for help when my boiler broke down during a bitter cold snap, leaving me with no heating or hot water. I was told that somebody would be sent round “in a couple of weeks”. I rang a local plumber and had my boiler looked at that afternoon, and fixed (new part required) the next day.
I cancelled my HomeCare policy.
Malcolm Beaton
Towcester, Northamptonshire
Waiting on the DBS
SIR – I would advise Duncan Rayner (Letters, December 16), who has been waiting six weeks for his DBS clearance, to apply for an automatic update.
This system is not well-advertised, but has worked for me since its inception. Mr Rayner should go on to the government website and apply within 28 days of receipt of clearance. It will save further applications (provided, of course, he commits no crime in the meantime).
Dorothy Woolliscroft
Attleborough, Norfolk
Drummer’s choice
SIR – I am prompted by the letters (December 15) concerning unconventional uses for a Daily Telegraph to recall the greatest jazz drummer of his generation, Phil Seaman, who I followed around London in the late-1960s. He was never without a pair of drumsticks – which he would carry only inside a rolled-up copy of this paper.
Apparently the consistency, size and quality of the Telegraph, rather than the content, were the key factors here, but it inspired me to buy the paper from that day on.
Stephen Pound
London W7
BBC Shakespeare
SIR – Several decades ago, the BBC (Letters, December 16) televised the whole canon of Shakespeare’s plays.
Attempting to watch a recent Royal Shakespeare Company recording of Cymbeline, text in hand, I suddenly realised that the queen was being played by a large bearded man in a suit, and the king by a rather shorter woman in a frock.
I switched to the version made by the BBC. It was well-acted, well-directed and perfectly straightforward to follow.
Tom Stubbs
Surbiton, Surrey
Weetabix wisdom
SIR – If you have difficulty unwrapping your wheat biscuits – I choose Tesco’s own rather than Weetabix (Letters, December 16) – I suggest you just cut off the top using a sharp pair of scissors. Works for me.
Tim Bochenski
Bramhall, Cheshire
SIR – The Weetabix problem is easily solved.
1. Take an 11-by-8 in plastic or tin box (M&S’s 650g shortbread tin is ideal).
2. Place two unwrapped Weetabix packets in the box, side by side.
3. Slit the packets open.
4. Hold the cereal bowl over the box when removing your Weetabix. Result: no crumbs falling on the table.
5. Pour crumbs from the box over the last two Weetabix removed and enjoy the equivalent of a three-Weetabix breakfast.
Pamela Chalk
Bournemouth, Dorset
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