The Tories and the hospital site 1
Entry on this website 2nd Dec 2006:
Follow this link to support the campaign to save Surbiton Hospital. http://www.surreycomet.co.uk/surbitonshospital/. The three of us are totally committed to seeing the Hospital survive and develop into a ‘state of the art’ health care facility for Surbiton. We are also very concerned that the perilous financial position of our Primary Care Trust is still putting our hospital’s future at risk. We also hear that some in government believe there’s ‘too much hospital provision in this part of London’.
Entry on this website 13th Dec 2006:
Though we have in the past been given undertakings that the future of the Hospital is not under long term threat, this further burden on the PCT’s finances cannot but cause more anxiety about the future.
We will continue to campaign, as we always have, for the retention of the Hospital site by the NHS and its upgrading to a ‘state of the art’ medical facility for the people of Surbiton.
This elicited the following comment from Paul Sloan an apparent Lib Dem supporter:
What’s the point of every little nook and cranny having its own hospital?
It’s no distance from Surbiton to Kingston Hospital.
Why not sell the site for housing (its a superb prime site right by the station), and reinvest the money either
1. by centralising facilities in Kingston.
2. rebuilding somewhere cheaper.
The same goes for that old peoples home on Browns road. It’s an inefficeint use of a prime site. Sell it and put in somewhere cheaper like the back of berrylands, or tolworth.
To which we responded:
……….. Surbiton is not a ‘little nook or cranny’. We entirely appreciate that some services need the concentrated resources of a big sub-regional hospital like Kingston. But minor surgical procedures, convalescent facilities, physiotherapy should be available closer to patients’ homes. We have advocated a redevelopment which would embrace the services formerly provided in Surbiton with the addition, among other things, of the possible relocation of GP facilities from Oakhill, which is bursting at the seams. ….
So you see that we have never wanted to sell off the site either of the hospital or ‘that old people’s home in Browns Road (Newent House). But there were others who did.
If you want further evidence of the consistent approach of Surbiton Hill’s former Conservative Councillors on this issue I can provide it, or you can find it for yourself on this website.
Much more of the stuff the Fib Dem candidate and his agent are putting out, including in their latest spectacular work of fiction, will have them looking like Pinocchio.
Let’s get positive!
What’s this by-election all about? At the end of the day it’s about all the people of Surbiton Hill getting the honest, dedicated representation they need and deserve.
Nick Kilby has set out clearly and truthfully his record (our record) of working with local residents over a number of years, contributing whatever we could to all the various communities that go to make up Surbiton Hill Ward. This commitment didn’t stop with the election of 2010. We carried on with it and are still doing so.
Nick stands for honesty in politics. We have always believed in decent, respectful behaviour towards all residents whether they vote for us or not and in telling the truth. We sincerely wish our Lib Dem opponents would take the same approach. Sadly they don’t and the latest Focus, containing the fresh lie that we wanted to sell off the hospital site for housing, shows that they intend to carry on with the negative tone they have adopted throughout this campaign.
Behaviour of this sort undermines democracy and should not be tolerated. They have given us no choice but to defend ourselves from it as best we can.
Let’s get positive this week. The only sure way to defeat the negatives is to vote for Nick on Thursday – or earlier if you have a postal vote!
No laughing matter………
According to his reported remarks in this week’s Surrey Comet, Roger Hayes is inclined to treat the letter he has received from our solicitor as a stunt. We assure him and his candidate that this is no stunt and we intend to be taken very seriously.
He has published a ‘Focus’ leaflet in which
John Ayles explains “The Conservative candidate in this by-election was a leading opponent of the new school and backer of their own nonsensical plans. Why on earth did he want to stop a new school in his own ward, or want to kick elderly people out of a home and see a valuable community asset sold off.”
This statement is untrue and defamatory. Further Mr. Ayles is now implicated with him as the author of this untrue and defamatory statement.
Nick Kilby has never been opposed to a new school in this area. In fact he was one of the local representatives who at the time led demands that the Liberal Democrat Council recognise the need for primary school places across the Borough, and provide a new school in this area. He has consistently been in favour of this provision. He has also never articulated his support in word or print for any proposal to sell off any community asset or old people’s home, and to assert that he was willing to “kick elderly people out of their home” is a blatant lie. What is more Nick was at great pains to point this out the first time Mr. Ayles uttered this statement.
This is not, as the Comet has it, ‘a spat’. It is a serious matter, as our further advice tells us
‘the issues that you have raised may require investigation by the Police because the making of false statements, and a failure to display the required details on an election publication, are both election related criminal offences under the Representation of the People Act, 1983.’
The other issue by the way is the widespread issue of another ‘Focus’ leaflet in the ward during the election campaign, which does not bear the identifying marks which election law requires. Mr. Hayes is responsible in law for the conduct of his candidate’s campaign.
The Liberal Democrats of all people should be aware of how seriously the Law now takes the uttering of false statements about rival candidates. It was on their petition that Phil Woolas (Lab. Oldham East and Saddleworth) was recently deprived of his parliamentary seat for just such an offence as that allegedly committed by Mr. Ayles and his agent.
The electors of Surbiton Hill should be aware of this. If you vote Liberal Democrat, this is the kind of thing you’re voting for.
Last night at Neighbourhood
A connoisseur of Neighbourhood meetings writes to me this morning:-
What a tedious lacklustre meeting it was!
The chairman wasn’t exactly dynamic and none of the usual sparkling councillors were ‘sparkling.’
It all seemed a bit tired and waffly and just went on and on and on.
Again our local councillors had little to say – well little of any importance.
They just seemed to speak at times as though they felt they had to remind the public they were there.
And we had the usual ‘apology’ from Mr Self of lack of experience on these matters.
I left at 21:45 and they were only on the third item then!
Hey-ho.
If Mr. Self is still ‘inexperienced in these matters’ he could always move over and make way for someone else who isn’t!
Let’s hope that next time some of the old sparkle will have returned!
Lib Dems seen through at last
The Lib Dem campaign is rapidly losing its wheels.People are getting increasingly angry over the repeated insults to their experience and intelligence put out by the ‘Focus’ team – especially on the hospital site issue.
One correspondent describes their statements as ‘a bare faced lie’ of which the Lib Dem candidate should be ashamed. Another describes his latest leaflet as ‘the biggest lie yet’.
What is clear is that the candidate and his entire team are out of touch with Surbiton Hill – a ward of which they remain largely ignorant. This is hardly surprising, given that the candidate has taken no part in the public life of the ward hitherto and his supporting team seems to consist of others from well outside the ward.
Just for interest………
Bridget Walker writes:-
Hi
I thought you might be interested to know that the Police Station on the Ewell Road near me is going to be turned into a Study Centre open 10-6 for 80 students (50% from overseas) with 17 car spaces (How many are being allocated to the hospital site for teachers?) It goes to committee on 7th Sep with a recommendation for approval. No doubt Kingston would have said that the site was too small for a school!! It started life as a school before being a police station and they must have known it was being sold before they settled on the hospital site. As the site is of Townscape merit it will not be altered just added to.
Hope you are all well
Bridget Walker
Surbiton Forum 