Who is making the decisions?

24/09/2009 by Steve Barclay.

Why is the decision to cut our paramedic cover being made by people who are both unelected themselves and not answerable to an elected body?  Why is there so much confusion over exactly who is making this decision and why?  Is it too much to ask that residents in Littleport, Sutton and Little Downham get a straight answer when their lives could be put a risk by a reduction in paramedic cover?

The East of England Ambulance Trust covers Essex, Sussex, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. It is so large nobody seems to know what is going on.  As one secretary just said to me on the phone, “we are so big now we don’t know everyone anymore and it does not always link up.“ 

Even a straightforward question as to where the Chief Executive is based does not get a straight answer.  The Head Office is in Bury St Edmonds (or at least that is where the Chief Executive‘s PA is located), but most of the time the senior managers I am told are travelling.  The Trust also has offices in Norwich, Bedford, and Essex.  Clearly the tight travel cost controls which apply to those of us working in the private sector don’t apply here.  Why not cut the travel budget and pay for paramedics instead?

Voters have no control over those making these decisions.  Nor do their elected representatives.  East Cambridgeshire District Council Leader Fred Brown is opposed to these cuts.  Our Member of Parliament Malcolm Moss is opposed.  No MEP from any political party has called for these cuts.  And yet a paramedic car has been taken from a rural area, which is a potentially life threatening journey away from the nearest hospital, and moved to Cambridge which has Addenbrooke‘s Hospital on its doorstop.

In theory the East of England Ambulance Trust answers to the Strategic Health Authority, but in practice their remit seems confused (staff at the Ambulance Trust again were unable to set out the grounds for where their respective remits start and stop).  The process is further complicated as their decision are also influenced by the various Primary Care Trusts.  Other decision making bodies are also involved, like Cambridgeshire Horizons.  So many officials and committees, yet still no answers.

Residents in East Cambridgeshire are right to be angry.  They deserve to know who is responsible.  It is easy for me to point to the Government, but the problem runs deeper than that.  Yes Labour‘s national targets play a part, and yes they are to blame for the crazy confused governance structure.  But what is worse is that senior and well paid managers in the Ambulance Trust appear to see accountability to taxpayers paying their salaries as a petty inconvenience treated with disdain. 

If the East of England Ambulance Trust thinks it is immune from effective accountability then they may have a shock after the General Election.  The next Government needs to ensure decisions like this affecting the public are taken by those elected directly by the public, or immediately answerable to elected figures held responsible on their behalf.

Posted in Paramedics, Little Downham, Sutton, Littleport | No Comments »