Skewed GP inspections fail patients

GPs believe that delivering the best possible care for patients in Yorkshire should be a priority for the NHS, but new inspection arrangements for GP practices are likely to leave patients confused and GP services tangled in yet more paperwork.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has announced measuring GPs against 38 chosen targets that will penalise GP practices such as if they don’t hold a specific number of health care meetings and enter specific data on their computers. This skewed and limited information does not tell us about the quality of care patients receive, and even the CQC itself has said that they are not a “judgement” on the practice. Neither is there any context about the circumstances it operates in, such as the levels of deprivation in its local community or their level of funding. All this is bizarrely being put on the web before CQC inspectors have even walked through the practice door.

These simplistic targets take no account the enormous pressures GP practices are under from falling funding, rising patient demand, a shortage of GPs and buildings that haven’t had any investment in decades.

The CQC would be serving Yorkshire patients better if it called for a solution to the problem GPs face. This must include more resources to enable the NHS to take on more GPs and nurses, and made sure that any information provided to patients gave them the full picture about their local services.

We are led 
by children

From: Marlene Harvey, St Margaret’s Road, Methley

I COULDN’T agree more with Tom Richmond’s comments (The Yorkshire Post, November 19) on our out-of-touch politicians. I listen regularly to Radio Four, the Parliamentary “debates” and Prime Minister’s Questions.

There is little difference in the noise of their petty bickering and point scoring and the shouts and general hubbub of the children in the playground at the nearby primary school, except the children are not leading our country. Perhaps it would make more sense if they were?

Mail fails
to compete

From: RG Isle, Adel, Leeds.

I READ your newspaper’s Business section (The Yorkshire Post, November 20) with particular reference to Royal Mail. It is no surprise the business is suffering and it is likely to get worse.

Yesterday, I needed to post a parcel. The value of the contents were insignificant (about £5) but the quoted postage cost by Royal Mail was £12.98, which was outrageous. I was forced to look at alternative means of sending the parcel and I ended up with Hermes at a cost of just £4.40 plus VAT – total £5.28.

So, the Royal Mail has not lost just one parcel but now that I’ve done the research and learned the ropes, I will never go back to the Post Office/Royal Mail parcel service again. I send about 100 parcels per year and the average cost is about £6 each. That is a loss of revenue of over £600 from just one customer – Royal Mail needs to get its act together!

Error over county town

From: M Bielby, Cromwell Avenue, Loftus in Cleveland.

I HAVE enjoyed Chris Berry’s columns over the years but he shocked me (The Yorkshire Post, November 15). Northallerton has not “been the county town of the North Riding since the 1970s”. It was the county town of the North Riding when I was born in 1943, when my father was born in 1908 and for many, years before then.

It has been the headquarters of North Yorkshire County Council since 1974 – a county council area which does not cover some chunks of the North Riding and includes places which never were in the North Riding.

A welcome 
ban on Blanc

From: Amjad Bashir, UKIP MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire, Leeds.

THE decision by the Home Office to ban controversial US “pick up artist” Julien Blanc from this country is very welcome.

I have been among those to have publicly voiced anger at his sexually abusive methods and his plans to bring his appalling seminars here and I am delighted that he will now not be allowed onto our shores.

But wouldn’t it be nice if the Home Office took such a firm stand against hate-mongers, terrorists and murderers who come our way?

Confusion over figures

From: Allan Davies, Grimsby.

THERE is a little confusion in the first two sentences of the article from Rev Neil McNicholas (The Yorkshire Post, November 20).

He says that those who exceed speed limits and drive recklessly must surely be in a minority. In the next sentence he quotes the number of fixed penalty notices and observes that it represents only those who were caught.

Without an estimate of the probability that speeding motorists will be caught, he cannot draw the conclusion in the first sentence. With speed cameras that probability will increase, which explains the opposition to them.