IN response to Graham Brinksman’s letter of last week I would remind him that Labour in 2009 and 2010 had refused to acede to persistent requests from relatives of victims of the Mid Staffs Hospital scandal to hold an inquiry.

In July 2010 immediately after the Labour Government was out of office, a public enquiry began chaired by Robert Francis QC.

The horrifying evidence uncovered was described as ‘the worst hospital care scandal of recent times’ and why it was allowed to persist for so long were many reasons including inadequate staffing and chronic shortage of nursing staff resulting in up to 1,300 needless deaths.

The Francis enquiry triggered further checks, which were then carried out into other hospitals ‘with higher than expected’ death rates like Mid Staffs.

Prof Sir Bruce Keogh looked into 14 other hospitals in England and confirmed that 11 of them would be put into ‘special measures’ to push through urgent improvements in patient care.

Mortality rates since 2005 under Labour suggested thousands more people may have died than would have normally been expected at the 14 trusts reviewed by Sir Bruce.

Yes Cameron did say before 2010 he would have no more pointless reorganisations in the NHS but faced with these atrocious findings in our hospitals, what would Mr Brinksman have had him do? Nothing? Nothing had been done for years under Blair and Brown.

With regard to cash cows for private investors’ the biggest of all is PFIs (the Private Finance Initiative) introduced by John Major to help fund public sector works. But they were widely expanded in the NHS by Labour to construct new buildings without the Government having to pay for them.

We have 60 hospitals run by 20 trusts that are currently in serious financial trouble thanks to Labour.

A EDWARDS
Fearnhead