BMA leader believes health secretary may be sacked if NHS bill is watered down Andrew Lansley may not survive as health secretary once the government’s “pause” over its controversial NHS shakeup ends, the leader of Britain’s doctors has said. Dr Hamish Meldrum, chairman of council at the British Medical Association, told the Guardian he believed Lansley may have to step down if the health and social care bill underwent major changes. “I deal in policies not personalities, but I agree that it might be difficult for him to stay on if we see the significant changes to the reforms that we [the BMA] are asking for. But that’s not a decision that’s mine to make – it’s for the prime minister,” Meldrum said. “But yes, it’s true that his credibility would be badly damaged if the bill was watered down because he [Lansley] is so personally associated with the reforms.” The BMA leader’s intervention articulates a growing feeling both at Westminster and in NHS circles that Lansley could lose his job because of the difficulty created for the coalition by the deep unpopularity of his radical restructuring plans for the NHS in England. David Cameron has publicly backed the health secretary and insisted that the ongoing “listening exercise” on the legislation will lead to many more people understanding and accepting the plans. But the prime minister is frustrated that Lansley has made the NHS once again a problem issue for the Conservatives, so soon after they had neutralised it. Health policy experts believe that David Laws, the Liberal Democrat who resigned as chief secretary to the Treasury over his MP’s expenses soon after the coalition was formed last May, may return to cabinet as Lansley’s replacement. It has also been speculated that Philip Hammond, the transport secretary, or Stephen Dorrell, health secretary from 1995-1997 in John Major’s administration and current chair of the Commons health select committee, could take over. Friends admit that Lansley’s failure to win hearts and minds for his planned reorganisation has left him exposed. “Andrew’s intelligent and thoughtful and, as David Cameron says, no one knows more about the NHS than him,” said one. “But he has become too bogged down in the detail of the reorganisation and shown himself to be more of a thinker than a politician, and his lack of engagement over his plans with either health professionals or the public has left him somewhat isolated.” One health expert who is taken seriously in Downing Street said: “The question is: is he too toxic? I can’t believe he will stay on. To me it’s only a matter of time before he is replaced. Andrew Lansley means well and he knows a lot and he wants the best for the health service, but it hasn’t worked”. Lansley is widely seen to have failed to “do the politics” before unveiling his NHS masterplan. “Much of what’s in the health bill could command quite wide support, but he didn’t warm people up or get the key stakeholders on board,” said a pro-reform NHS policy specialist. “In such difficult times for the NHS you need a health secretary who can schmooze, do deals and get people on-board and that’s absolutely not Andrew Lansley.” Some of those working closely with Lansley on the “listening exercise” say that, despite criticism of his plans from an unprecedented array of bodies and individuals, and the Liberal Democrats, he still does not believe that they need major changes. Allies, though, say that he is “sufficiently flexible to respond to good ideas”, is putting considerable energy into engaging with stakeholders during the two-month pause and will clarify and improve his plans while maintaining their key principles, such as handing control of commissioning healthcare for patients from primary care trusts to GPs. One in three GPs plans to quit the NHS in the next five years and some blame the health reforms, according to a snapshot poll of 576 doctors for the magazine Pulse. • Join the debate on the future of the NHS on the NHS reforms blog NHS Health policy Andrew Lansley Health Doctors Public services policy Public sector cuts Public finance David Cameron Conservatives Rowenna Davis Denis Campbell guardian.co.uk
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Prevention is cheaper than cure is the motto of scheme operating in County Durham A couple of weeks ago I joined a regular organised bike ride starting in the village of West Rainton in County Durham . There were two trips of different distances that start from the same point every Sunday morning – for novice and intermediate cyclists. They are organised by a scheme called ” Get Active Get Cycling ” which is funded by the local NHS trust. The (very good) idea behind it is that preventing cardiovascular disease by encouraging people to get on their bikes is much better, and cheaper, for the NHS than treating the disease when it happens. These rides are excellent if you are not a confident cyclist or are thinking of getting back into the saddle after a long break – not least because you don’t actually have to own a bike. The Get Active team turn up with a van full of well-maintained and very comfortable mountain bikes (I know because I borrowed one) that are absolutely free to use. You can also borrow tag-along bikes for children who are not yet able to ride. “Because the project is completely free to all participants and equipment can be provided, the majority of people who attend the cycle rides borrow bikes and helmets from us,” said Nick Whitley, one of the organisers. And he says that many participants are novice or lapsed cyclists. “In order to help these participants as much as we can we also offer one to one tuition to help build confidence and improve basic skills whilst riding a bike,” he said. The project has funding until September 2012. I opted for the longer ride which was a leisurely saunter in an 8.5 mile loop through pleasant countryside around the village – mostly on cycle tracks and quiet roads. Now if you are a regular cyclist looking for a physical challenge and a demanding pace this ride would probably be a bit tame. But I found it a very enjoyable way to spend a Sunday morning and meet some new people. If you have a family with a mixture of cycling abilities and are looking for a safe organised ride then it would be ideal (novice riders take a shorter ride). The long term plan is for the weekly ride to become self sufficient, with locals acting as guides (some are already trained up) and the bikes kept in a shipping container parked permanently in the village. The Get Active team already run 14 similar weekly rides across the county (with 5 more starting in June) and have roughly 150 bikes to lend out. There is also a programme of summer events . You can find more information on the West Rainton ride on their Facebook page or for more information contact Nick Whitley by email ( nick.whitley@nhs.net ) or phone (0191-569 2847). Does anything like this operate in other parts of the country? If so, please post in the comments below. Cycling Cycling holidays Health NHS James Randerson guardian.co.uk
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Kevin Rushby visits the small Yorkshire festival where the headliners are a Twelfth Night puppet show Kevin Rushby
Continue reading …Kevin Rushby visits the small Yorkshire festival where the headliners are a Twelfth Night puppet show Kevin Rushby
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The Bank of England’s monetary policy committee (MPC) had been widely predicted to lift interest rates this month Homeowners are set for another reprieve as rate-setters at the Bank of England are expected to keep the cost of borrowing at its record low. The Bank of England’s monetary policy committee (MPC) had been widely predicted to lift interest rates this month from 0.5% to rein in soaring inflation – but the picture has changed in recent weeks. Economists believe the latest set of gross domestic product (GDP) figures – which last week showed a tepid 0.5% rise between January and March – has killed off any chance of a May interest rate hike. However, there were calls today from the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) for interest rates to rise as it expects surging oil prices to put further pressure on UK inflation. In its global economic forecast, NIESR warned the UK economic recovery would continue to be weak and the government was unlikely to hit its budget deficit targets . But the organisation also said inflation was likely to hit 5% in the second half of this year as the turmoil in north Africa and the Middle East pushes up inflation and limits global growth. However, the rate of inflation unexpectedly slowed in April to 4%, which while still double the government’s target, did ease pressure on the MPC to take imminent action. Philip Shaw, economist at brokers Investec, said this week’s meeting had “lost its edge” as the risks of a rate hike had diminished. Shaw and other city analysts now expect a rate rise in the late summer or even November. This month also marks the last meeting for MPC member Andrew Sentance, who has been leading calls for a rate rise, voting for a half-point increase to 1%. The MPC will have sight of a preview of the latest quarterly Bank of England forecast, which is due out on 11 May and will offer predictions on GDP and inflation following recent developments. Allan Monks, economist at JP Morgan, also believes the MPC will remain in wait-and-see mode until at least August. He said: “The MPC remains understandably cautious about growth, given the drags in place from falling real incomes, fiscal tightening and weakening household confidence. We therefore see a rate increase at this week’s meeting as unlikely.” However, he added there was a possibility of a more robust GDP result for the second quarter as the recovery gained traction. Howard Archer, chief economist at IHS Global Insight, is not pencilling in a rate rise until November. “This reflects our belief that growth will be muted during much of 2011 and that a soft labour market will prevent higher inflation expectations feeding through to lift wage growth significantly,” he said. Interest rates Economics Bank of England Inflation guardian.co.uk
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• Oil-producing country has limited refining capacity • Bread and cash supplies also running low • International community accused of ‘trying to starve people’ Police officers in riot gear and armed with wooden staves have been manning fuel pumps at a petrol station in Tripoli as long queues of cars caused traffic chaos in western Libya, amid fears that the Gaddafi regime is running out of its most precious commodity. Queues of vehicles, sometimes five or six deep, stretched up to half a kilometre from some petrol stations last week, most of which are shut behind makeshift barriers. Two men in a queue near the city of Zuwara said they had been waiting for five days in the hope of a fresh delivery. At the few stations around the capital, where cars were inching forward, armed soldiers and police attempted to keep order as motorists and pedestrians carrying containers jostled to get served. Fights sometimes break out, according to locals. The Libyan government has blamed the fuel crisis on its own “mismanagement of distribution”. But deputy foreign minister Khaled Kaim also accused the international community of “trying to starve the Libyan people by cutting all supplies to 5.2 million people in the south and the west of the country”. The dearth of fuel is the most obvious sign of the economic impact of the crisis that has engulfed Libya for more than two months. But cigarette prices have doubled in the past month; bread is in short supply since Egyptian bakery workers fled the country; cash withdrawals from banks have been capped as the government faces a currency shortfall; many shops are shuttered as both supplies and customers dwindle. Nato has confirmed that 18 warships are patrolling waters outside Tripoli’s port to inspect cargo ships which could be carrying arms or other materials of potential military use to the regime. The sea embargo does not include deliveries of food, drugs or other basic needs, Nato said. However the terms of UN resolution 1970 covers any product deemed by Nato intelligence as destined for the Libyan military which could be used to attack civilians. “This can include the interception of oil tankers,” a spokesman said. Trade with Libya’s National Oil Corporation is banned under the UN embargo. However, in early April, the government circumvented sanctions when it imported fuel from Italy via Tunisia, transferring the load to a Libyan-owned ship outside the UN blacklist. Despite being an oil-producing country, Libya has limited refining capacity and in normal times imports most of its gasoline. Consumer prices are heavily subsidised, and since the crisis began the government has slashed reduced the cost of a litre. But low prices have little meaning when pumps are empty. Libya’s main refinery is in Tobruk, in the far east of the country and now in rebel hands, along with a second refinery in Ras Lanuf. The government is trying to increase capacity at its third refinery in Zawiya, around 50km (30 miles) west of the capital. The government is reluctant to discuss the fuel crisis, and journalists are instructed not to film petrol queues or interview people waiting in line. Unauthorised conversations reveal varied views about who is to blame for shortages. In Zuwara, 110km west of Tripoli, Tariq Dobroz, 35, one of those who had been waiting for a delivery for five days, said: “I’m angry. Before [the crisis], life was getting better. Now things are bad.” Local businessman Fawzi Aribi, 38, said: “If you lose money, benzine [fuel], food — you go crazy. Some are angry at the government, some are angry at the Europeans. Everybody has a different way of taking this.” In Tripoli’s old city, a gold and silver trader bitterly listed his grievances: “Business is bad; benzine, it’s finished; cigarette prices have doubled; food prices have risen.” Asked if he blamed the west, he said elliptically: “No, other things,” referring to the regime. A foreign diplomat in the capital said people in fuel queues were likely to turn their anger on the international alliance against the Libyan regime. “They are saying ‘we’re not involved in this yet we’re being punished.’” The regime’s economic difficulties are exacerbated by problems over cash supply. Withdrawals from banks are limited to 1,000 dinars a month amid fears that currency supplies are running low. According to finance minister Abdulhafid Zlitni, Libyans are hoarding cash — common in times of uncertainty — while a consignment of currency printed under contract in the UK has been hit by sanctions. “It’s our money, and we paid for it,” he said. The International Monetary Fund estimated in February that the Libyan regime had more than $100bn (£60bn) in foreign reserves. A significant proportion is believed to be beyond the reach of sanctions. The government has encouraged shopkeepers to open, despite the lack of customers, to keep an appearance of normality, although in fact many shops in Tripoli and other cities are shuttered. The owner of a women’s clothing store in Tripoli said he had been ordered to open his shop daily despite the fact that “I have no materials to sell”. Most restaurants and cafes are closed in the evenings. “People are scared to go out because of the shooting,” said the shop owner, referring to the gunfire that echoes around the city after dusk, often accompanied by the sound of Nato warplanes and anti-aircraft fire. Some officials are phlegmatic about UN sanctions, saying Libya has survived them before and will again now. “Just go back to history,” said Zlitni. “When sanctions were imposed in the 1990s, Africans just broke them. We managed to take a lot of precautions and were able to avoid a lot of problems.” But the official message is, as ever, one of anger directed at Nato and the international alliance. The purpose of the blockade “is to try to force problems in cities and towns in the west”, said Kaim. “The motive of Nato is clear: attacking from the air, surrounding the country with warships, cutting supplies by sea, trying to starve the people. “It’s not moral, not legitimate and not acceptable… But it’s not strange. Hitler and Mussolini, both of them were democratically elected but they committed atrocities. Once again, we can see western leaders committing atrocities in Libya or somewhere else.” Libya Middle East Oil Harriet Sherwood guardian.co.uk
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At least 15 people killed as suicide bomber rams car into police building in Hilla A car bomb has killed at least 15 people and wounded 25 in the predominantly Shia city of Hilla, according to medical and police sources. A suicide bomber rammed his car into the entrance of a police headquarters on Thursday in Hilla, 100km (60 miles) south of Baghdad, during a shift change when many police officers were outside the building, the sources said. An interior ministry source in Baghdad put the toll at 16 killed and 50 wounded. Iraqi security forces went on high alert for revenge attacks after US forces killed the al-Qaida leader, Osama bin Laden. Iraq has been a battlefield for the Islamist militant group since the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein. US and Iraqi officials claim al-Qaida in Iraq has been severely weakened in recent years. But eight years after Saddam’s overthrow, Iraq still faces a lethal insurgency that carries out dozens of bombings and other attacks each month, many of them on Iraqi police, soldiers and government officials. Hilla was hit by one of the deadliest attacks in Iraq in May last year when two suicide car bombers drove into the entrance of a textile factory as workers were ending a shift, killing at least 35 people and wounding 135. A third bomb exploded as police and medics rushed to the scene. On Monday, four people were wounded when a bomb attached to a car in a car park exploded in Hilla. Iraq Global terrorism Middle East guardian.co.uk
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Ventilation equipment being connected to try to absorb radiation in Japanese power plant damaged by earthquake and tsunami Workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have entered one of the damaged reactor buildings for the first time since it was hit by an explosion days after a devastating earthquake, Japan’s nuclear safety agency said. The plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), said workers were connecting ventilation equipment in Unit 1 to try to absorb radiation from the air inside the building. The work is expected to take about four or five days. Radiation levels inside the reactor must be lowered before a cooling system can be installed. The previous cooling system was damaged by the 11 March quake and subsequent tsunami that left more than 25,000 people dead or missing along Japan’s north-east coast. Workers have not been able to enter the reactor buildings at the plant, about 140 miles north-east of Tokyo, since the first days after the tsunami. Hydrogen explosions in four of the buildings at the six-reactor complex in the first few days destroyed some of their roofs and walls and scattered radioactive debris. In mid-April, a robot recorded radioactivity levels of about 50 millisieverts an hour inside Unit 1′s reactor building – a level too high for workers to safely enter. The decision to send in the workers on Thursday was made after robots collected fresh data last Friday that showed radiation levels had fallen in some areas of the reactor, said Taisuke Tomikawa, a spokesman for Tepco. Two workers entered the building at around 11.30am (3.30am BST). Due to the high radioactivity, teams were expected to go into the building on rotation for short periods, Tomikawa said. “This is an effort to improve the environment inside the reactor building,” he said. Since the crisis Japanese authorities more than doubled the legal limit of radiation exposure for nuclear workers to 250 millisieverts a year. Workers in the US nuclear industry are allowed an upper limit of 50 millisieverts per year. Doctors say radiation sickness sets in at 1,000 millisieverts and leads to nausea and vomiting. Radiation leaking from the Fukushima plant has forced 80,000 people living within a 12-mile (20km) radius to leave their homes. Many are living in gymnasiums and community centres. Japan disaster Nuclear power Japan Energy guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Authorities have dubbed them the “marijuana grannies.” Police in San Bruno, California, arrested Aleen Lam, 72, and Virginia Chan Pon, 65, after officers found 800 pot plants and a bypass to steal electricity from PG&E in the women’s house, reports AP . The senior duo faces a slew of related charges.
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Lloyds had make a pre-tax profit of £1.1bn in the same three months a year ago Bailed-out Lloyds Banking Group has sunk to a first quarter loss after taking a larger than expected provision of £3.2bn to cover the costs of misselling payment protection insurance. New chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio has also upped the impairment charge for bad loans by £500m more than expected, blaming the situation in Ireland where the bank was a major lender following its rescue of HBOS during the 2008 banking crisis. It is expecting another 10% fall in commercial property prices in Ireland. The £3.2bn provision for PPI forced the bank to report a pre-tax loss of £3.4bn barely three months after the former boss Eric Daniels had heralded the return to a first full-year profit for the bailed-out bank since the crisis. The bank had make a pre-tax profit of £1.1bn in the same three months a year ago and insisted that its performance was “satisfactory” on what it calls a combined business basis, which strips out the costs associated with the integration. On this measure profits were £284m. The PPI provision follows the high court judgement on 20 April which upheld a ruling by the Financial Services Authority that banks should compensate customers retrospectively for PPI. Signalling a new approach to PPI, where banks have stalled on compensation, Horta Osorio said on Thursday: “It is appropropriate to take a provision now and move on.” The £3.4bn of losses also included integration costs of £333m. The bank reiterated its surprise at the independent banking commission’s decision to suggest more branches should be sold off in addition to 600 branches demanded by the EU in return for almost £20bn of taxpayer aid. For the whole of 2010 the bank took a £13.1bn hit from bad debt provisions – some £5.7bn related to problems in Ireland and Australia inherited from the controversial HBOS deal. Lloyds Banking Group Banking António Horta-Osório Payment protection insurance Jill Treanor guardian.co.uk
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