Letters: May 31, 2016

Anonymity is granted only at the discretion of the editor, who also reserves the right to edit letters.

Warnings offer insight

THE fact that David Cameron has taken the side of the remain camp in the upcoming referendum and has used the Treasury to issue such dire warnings associated with leaving the EU, gives us an insight into how the departments of government use forecasts to influence public opinion on issues other than Britain’s relationship with the EU.

Over previous years governments have been quite successful over the issue of the dangers of climate change and especially the severe health risks associated with cigarettes and their use in buildings with access to the public.

NG WARNER

Carlisle Avenue, Swindon

....

Grateful to volunteers

THIS is Volunteers’ Week: The Big Celebration and what better time to recognise the incredible work of our 91,000 Scouting volunteers?

Today Scouting provides fun and adventure to almost 6,000 young people in Wiltshire. We build confidence, self-esteem and help girls and boys, young men and women aged 6-25 develop the skills and values they need to succeed in life.

But what does volunteering mean? It’s about finding an organisation whose values align with your own. It’s about finding a cause you feel passionately about and which allows you to grow as a person. It’s about using your skills and learning more.

For our 1,100 volunteers, Scouting provides these opportunities. In Scouting, adults as well as young people make new friends, try new things and develop skills that they use in their everyday lives. Volunteering for Scouting is flexible and fits around work and volunteer commitments. We work especially hard to find roles that are matched to a person’s interests and talents.

Perhaps most importantly volunteering is about contributing something to the local community. From the Chief Scout, Bear Grylls, to the leader of the local Beaver Scout Colony, every one of our volunteers does their bit.

On behalf of Wiltshire Scouts, may I say a very heartfelt thank you to our volunteers. And if you feel inspired by what you’ve read, whether you’re an adult or young person, we would welcome you to the Scouting family and support your development too.

STEPHEN BARLEY

County Commissioner for Wiltshire Scouts

....

Vote can go either way

I HAVE just read Gill Harris’s article in today’s Adver about the EU.

She is absolutely right with her comment that “We must be the laughing stock of Europe”.

They don’t want us to leave because our Nett Contribution of just over £8 billion is vital for their expenditure.

We had a recession in the 1980s and earlier this century and we recovered, without the help of the EU, and as we all know recessions occur every now and then and recovery is achieved.

I genuinely think that David Cameron, George Osborne and the rest of their crowd quietly really don’t mind which way the vote goes because if the vote is to stay in and there is another recession, they can blame the EU and if the vote is to leave they can blame the British people.

They can all then either carry on or retire and take their paltry pensions.

So we are not only the laughing stock of Europe but also the laughing stock of these MPs.

GERRY TAYLOR

Newcastle Street, Swindon

....

Repugnant advertising

JUST when I thought the EU Referendum campaign couldn’t manufacture another outrageous canard along comes Operation Black Vote with what will surely be classed as the most distasteful, morally repugnant and racist advertisement yet to be seen.

Picture the scene – at one end of the see-saw a diminutive elderly lady of Indian origin resplendent in her colourful sari simply smiling, while at the other end sits a male character portrayed as almost double her size, replete with jeans and bovver boots, tattooed arms and shaven head with an angry snarl on his face and his arm extended with a finger pointing directly at the benign little old lady.

Now call me cynical but what message is this intended to convey?

Just imagine the outrage if instead of the image of a white supremacist thug snarling like a rabid dog at the ‘lovely little lady’ the picture had featured a gang of Pakistani men surrounding a white girl, leering at her with obvious intent in their eyes, or a black man towering over a white man suggesting he might offer some respect – we would rightly have been aghast at the crass attitude of the people who considered such imagery to be appropriate nevermind pertinent to the EU referendum.

The message could not be clearer, if you are a member of a minority ethnic group vote Remain or be prepared to be abused by the white indigenous population.

Such nonsense has become the hallmark of the remain camp; having failed to convince anyone that meaningful and lasting reform of the EU has been achieved they have simply promoted fear of the supposed unknown as their weapon of choice. Thankfully the people of Swindon are too savvy to fall for Mr Cameron’s hyperbole and have greater confidence in the ability of our great nation to survive and prosper outside of the EU.

DES MORGAN

Caraway Drive, Swindon

....

Fight cannot continue

MIKE says “why not stay in the EU and fight from the inside”, which was repeated by Des Morgan (The Adver, May 25).

To me what a complete and utter waste of time even trying to ask. It's like Oliver Twist asking for more gruel. The leaders of the UK have, since the 70s, been trying to get a better deal for the UK fighting from within. It does not work. Prime ministers, senior politicians, any MEP who hangs around in Brussels over the past 30 odd years, have all been told in no uncertain terms "no chance" in every language from the other 27 countries and have all come back to the UK with their tails between their legs. Mr Cameron's latest try was just typical of the contempt we are held in by the EU and it will not change if we unfortunately stay connected to the EU. The scare tactics being used by the stay brigade just show me how shaky the fight to remain camp is.

We have not won nor gained anything by being connected with the EU and not won anything from within nor will we in the future, if we stay then all I can see for the future is more of the same we have had to put up with over the past 30 odd years. You cannot fight from within if you are already beaten.

JOHN L CROOK

Haydon Wick

....

'Lean' take on industry

THIS week’s story, that the Health Service has maxed out its overspending at £2.45 billion in the last year makes one wonder about not just next year … but about the next 50 years?

A colleague of mine applied some time ago to join the governing trust at GWH. Now he is hugely competent, a guy who had spent 45 years in a real industry, actually making things, ending up as a director of a business with several factories in the UK and USA employing more than 2,000 people and with $210 million in annual sales. I will come back to this.

On Thursday I attended GWH for an abdominal scan. A pleasant receptionist (one of two) asked me to take a seat. I waited 40 minutes and during that time I saw at least six different nurses come out and call patients to different rooms. At least four other NHS staff doing, I have no clue what, also walked through the waiting area. I was eventually seen, looked after well and following a very thorough examination told I seemed OK for a bit longer! Good news, but that is not the point.

I started thinking how a ‘lean’ engineer would look at this process, how would industry manage this, in fact how would my aforementioned colleague set about improving this organisation? For those who are not familiar with ‘lean’ it means reducing cost by removing all non-value added steps. It means looking at every action, every step in a process and asking “why?”

It removes waste and focuses on only those things that provide customer value. It is not new. Toyota introduced these disciplines in the 50s. In a lean business, I would have been expected. My name on a touch screen. I would touch in on arrival and it would ask me to take a seat. My radiologist would know I was there. A message board would tell me to proceed to room x when it was my turn. The nurses would then be redeployed to the wards or A & E where they are desperately needed delivering true “customer value”. This ‘design of process’ is why cars cost little more now, in real terms, than they did ten years ago.

I could not help thinking that the present process must have been identical to when the GWR set up its Medical Fund Hospital in Faringdon Road in 1871.

The Health Service is a business and should draw on the best business practice internationally, and that does not mean or require privatisation in any form.

It does mean the trust waking up, embracing change and realising they have a duty to extract real customer value from a stable or marginally increasing pot of income.

Oh, and my colleague? He was told they preferred someone with ‘audit experience’, checking up on the checkers up.

'Lions led by donkeys’ springs to mind.

JOHN STOOKE

Haydon End