Two sides to flag’s story

I WOULD like to thank Bill Tanner for his article ‘When the city provided a home to war refugees’, highlighting the plight of the Belgian refugees during the First World War.

As Hereford was the first city in the country to admit them this should be celebrated for its historical and cultural importance, particularly as we approach the commemoration of the war.

While I would be interested to discover whether any relatives of former refugees are living in the county, my main point of contact with the mayor, councillor Phil Edwards, concerned a unique flag given to the city.

A small delegation of Belgian refugees met with the mayor, Councillor GB Greenland, on November 9, 1915 and presented him with a handmade silk flag with the Union flag and a message on one side and the Belgian colours on the other.

Offering it to the mayor, one of the delegates said: “Will you accept this flag as a small testimony of our thankfulness, and at the same time receive the assurance of our eternal gratitude.”

The mayor warmly thanked those involved and promised the city would always treasure it and reassured them that the flag would be placed in a prominent position in the town hall, as a perpetual reminder of the link between two great nations.

I wondered how many of your readers are aware of this flag’s existence or know where it can be found in the town hall?

Certainly it isn’t prominently displayed as Coun Greenland had promised; in fact the Belgian flag is hidden from view, placed in a suspended glass frame against a wall in the council chamber; only the Union flag side is visible!

A picture purported to be of the flag can be found on the wall below it but it’s not the Belgian colours of black, yellow and red.

I firmly believe this important artefact should be repositioned to enable both sides of the flag to be visible.

If any of your readers agree with me, please make your views known by contacting the mayor’s secretary – Gill March – 01432 260438 or email: mayor@ herefordcitycouncil.gov.uk.

STUART DOVE Millway, Sutton St Nicholas

Fighting for health care

EARLIER this year the NHS was effectively abolished. And perhaps the most shocking thing of all is that most people didn’t even realise.

We have worked in the NHS continuously for more than 25 years, and together we have been working in Hereford general practice for more than 100 years. We are deeply proud of our comprehensive, free-at-the- point-of-access health service. So how can this have happened? It can’t be right, can it?The Health and Social Care Act became law in April 2013. Within this huge piece of legislation, there are two key changes to the NHS as we know it: 1.The Government no longer has a duty to provide health services solely through the NHS. This increases the opportunity for private health care firms to deliver services.

2.There is now a legal requirement for NHS services to be put out to tender, except in certain limited circumstances. This is regardless of whether the local commissioners are happy with their current NHS provider. Locally we have already seen a contract for NHS audiology services awarded to Specsavers, in direct competition to the excellent and long-standing department at the County Hospital.

The National Health Service has been replaced by what would be more accurately called a national health commissioning service.

This will likely lead to a fragmentation of services, with competition replacing collaboration, and profit replacing a responsibility to provide care.

This erosion of teamwork and trust will surely undermine the quality of care.

These changes were vigorously opposed by all but one of the 26 Royal Medical Colleges, and 90 per cent of GPs were against them.

Before these changes, the NHS was one of the most effective and cost-efficient health services in the world and was very popular with the people of the UK.

The NHS is being required to make drastic efficiency savings. Between £15 billion and £20 billion will have been cut from the NHS budget by 2015.

This is why we are losing so many A&E departments around the country, and other services are being reduced or cancelled.

People in Herefordshire may be aware that district nursing services are much more stretched, and counselling services very restricted.

Unless changes are made to reverse this legislation, we will end up with a very much poorer service, due to the combined effects of cuts in funding and fragmentation of providers.

Inevitably this will mean that many of those who can afford it will invest in private health insurance to receive the care they need.

Everyone else will be left to try to cope.

This is how healthcare works in the USA, where a much more expensive service still leaves people dying and untreated because of a lack of ability to pay.

Herefordshire has an excellent clinical commissioning group, doing the best possible job in the circumstances.

However, its hands are tied by the cuts in funding and the effects of the Health and Social Care Act.

Strangely, the mainstream media is not really highlighting this grave situation. So we need to raise awareness – talk to your friends and neighbours, ask your local doctors what they think, speak to your MP, write letters to the Hereford Times.

And when 2015 comes around, let’s make this the main issue all parliamentary candidates are asked about.

After 65 incredibly successful years, don’t let’s allow the NHS to be abolished like this on our watch.

DR MARK WATERS DR PAULA ADAMS DR VAL GOODGER DR PAUL HARRIS DR ANDY JONES DR DIANA MAJEED (Herefordshire GPs)

PC helps me keep in touch

HEREFORDSHIRE is a wise old county and I’m probably not the only old-timer who remembers High Town being the height of the town and supermarkets being a thing of the future.

But I have learned something in the last year or two which has given me back the spark of youth – the internet.

It all started when my grandson bought me a laptop.

It was terrifying at first and I know most pensioners find it intimidating.

But once I got to grips with it, I was overcome with excitement at the information out there.

Never have I been so well informed about Hereford or the country in general and I must say my retirement has been much less lonely since.

LESLIE MOFFAT, St James, Hereford

Lobbying bill no gag order

IN Readers’ Times , dated January 30 there were two letters from my constituents about the lobbying bill.

One of them has been in touch with me throughout the progress of the bill and the other never contacted me at all to seek my views.

The bill does not seek to limit any organisation expressing its views on policy issues.

What it does seek to do is make the public aware when an organisation or charity is campaigning for the electoral success of a particular party or candidate; for example, when an organisation is donating money to a political party or individual.

Charities which campaign solely on policy issues rather than being involved in party politics are completely exempt.

I believe it is essential that my constituents know when a group is working to support a specific party or candidate and that people are aware how much money is being spent on campaigns.

All political parties must declare what they spend at elections at both candidate and party level so it is consistent that organisations seeking to influence election results do the same.

Throughout the process of this bill I have tried to keep the constituents that contacted me abreast of the arguments and developments. I have constantly had to dispel myths put about by campaign groups that have tried to portray this bill as anti-democratic or gagging, when in fact the opposite is true.

The entire aim of the bill is to increase transparency, ensuring voters know when an organisation is attempting to influence them and prevent a situation where a candidate wins by having the richest supporters.

Far from ‘gagging’ the general public, the lobbying bill will ensure a more open, transparent election in 2015.

BILL WIGGIN, MP for North Herefordshire

New estate’s flooding risk

RESIDENTS of Wellington Marsh hamlet whose houses may be put at greater risk of flooding due to a proposed housing estate turned out in force to lobby Wellington parish council at an extraordinary meeting on January 30.

Wellington parish council was unanimous in its approval of new homes somewhere in the village but not in an isolated site such as being proposed by the owners of Kingcup Cottage.

Run-off into the brook under the A49 is a major issue as there is potential if water levels rose to prevent drainage from the marsh itself.

Travel to schools or workplaces for potential residents would involve the use not of teleporters, but the humble car as pedestrian access to the main village would involve crossing the A49 three times. The majority of ‘Martians’ in the settlement feel it is important to maintain the integrity and character of the hamlet.

Residents bought into ‘a sea of green tranquillity’ not an urban sprawl.

Martians would be grateful to those earthlings in opposition to contact Ground Control application number 133537.

MARK HORSBURGH The Marsh, Hereford

County can’t afford plant

£442 million, is the likely cost Herefordshire residents will have to pay to run the proposed mass burn incinerator until 2042, but costs could increase over the next 28 years. So that Worcestershire can build an incinerator, Herefordshire needs to fund a 26.8 per cent share of the £1.6 billion costs. These are costs which Herefordshire Council can ill afford.

We urge all residents in Herefordshire to lobby against this proposal. We urge ALL Herefordshire councillors to think twice and take time to fully consider the significant financial implications – implications which will undoubtedly result in further cuts to key services. Both councils are only considering landfill or incineration. A more robust and transparent decision process to consider cheaper better alternatives is needed.

Many local authorities (Warwickshire being just one example) are paid for their recycling whereas; incredulously we pay an additional £6 million per annum on top of expensive waste costs. Would this money be better spent on key services as opposed to shareholders reaping the benefits?

Could burning valuable resources waste hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money, at a time of deep austerity cuts? Why are more affordable alternatives not being considered?

We could be diverting most of the waste from landfill by increasing recycling which is in accord with the waste hierarchy.

Up to 68 per cent of waste is organic and could be treated much more cheaply than burning it, and still produce energy.

If the proposal goes ahead there is a real danger that you will have no option but to continue with the debts associated with this very expensive form of waste treatment until 2042 (with added future liabilities such as the carbon tax and a ban on the burning of recyclable materials etc).

In September 2013 Herefordshire County Council was offered the opportunity to deliver a waste option at zero capital cost, but this solution does not appear to have been explored. Why not?

Hereford needs to find £40 million towards construction costs of an incinerator.

There is the ability to adopt cheaper technologies which are included in the contract and which are used successfully by other local authorities. One of the contractor’s parent companies Urbaser will deal with 370,000 tonnes of waste per annum in Essex for half the cost we will pay.

WCC’s own report scores mass burn incineration as the WORST performing in terms of global warming, ecotoxicology, eutrophication and acidification.

The incinerator will produce 168,000 tonnes of damaging carbon dioxide per annum, along with toxic waste. Is it therefore irresponsible to proceed if health and environment can be detrimentally affected?

Councillors should not act in haste (documents state that there is space in landfill until at least 2028) giving ample time to examine successful methods used by other councils. (This could be undertaken within a short space of time).

We could then benefit from 21st century technologies at a lower cost.

The council has the ability to lobby against this proposal – councillors have the ability to vote against it and use the time to ensure that more cost effective solutions are properly examined. Financially, environmentally and morally we owe this to the residents of our counties.

ROB WILDEN Treasurer, Herefordshire and Worcestershire Action Group Waresley Park, Hartlebury, Worcestershire

Decision had to be made

NOT wishing to enter into a ‘ping pong’ of letters regarding the incinerator scrutiny and cabinet decision, however, I would like to respond to Councillor Harvey’s reply ( Readers’ Times , January 23).

I was disappointed to read the specious remark of my being “in receipt of very privileged information”

regarding the scrutiny of the energy from waste plant.

To be very clear, I receive the same information as every other councillor and nothing more.

Inevitably, councillors may draw different conclusions on matters for scrutiny, but in this instance the majority of councillors in both Herefordshire and Worcestershire agreed that the decision to go with the energy to waste plant at Hartlebury, which will use tried and tested technology, represented the best value for money and will dispose of our waste in a responsible manner.

There were important factual points raised in my letter that did not get a mention in her long reply.

An important point not addressed by Coun Harvey is the extreme financial penalties that Herefordshire Council would have had to pay if the deadline requirements had not been adhered to and thus the contract reneged upon, which would have resulted with swingeing penalty costs for the council and thus for the people of Herefordshire – important but a truth not acknowledged.

It is easy to oppose anything; it’s not so easy to make a viable, fully costed and sensible alternative plan and to meet a deadline.

As Coun Harvey well knows there was ten years to the end of the current ‘waste contract’ when the time came to sign and she was aware of the imperatives and the penalties.

This is not about bad contract management, as is implied, but the requirements of a contract that has been in place for many years and was reaching a critical point; however, a decision still had to be made and it was.

This council continues to face serious financial constraints, which will be ongoing, however, fundamental and important decisions must be made. Among these decisions is the essential service of waste disposal where we need to be able to make cost effective decisions and carry out policies; which we do, for the benefit of the people of Herefordshire.

COUN BARRY DURKIN Herefordshire Council, Old Gore Ward

Take home your litter

MARTIN Field of Burley Gate ( Readers’ Times , January 23), is right to highlight the problem of litter on the roads. Here in Pembridge our response has been to pick it up.

In 2013 we collected 46 bin liners of litter dropped from cars on the approach to the village in addition to the regular tidying each week of the village centre.

The problem of litter would be solved if only people took it home with them.

PHILIP ROGERS Pembridge

Alternative to bus service

I WISH to correct some mis - leading information in the article on page eight of January 23 issue of the Hereford Times where Dr Grub claims that there is no alternative transport available in the Much Dewchurch area.

Dore Community Transport has been providing a service in the area since 2000.

Although it is not able to run an alternative bus service, it can and does help a lot of people who come under the headings he mentions.

Herefordshire Council have issued a leaflet called ‘Travel Links’ which shows all the community schemes in the county and contact details. Information can also be obtained from the council website.

Dore CT can be contacted on 0845 2020144.

CHRIS TOMLINSON Volunteer driver and trustee, Dore Community Transport