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Here's the Mancunian Way for today:
Hello,
“Breaking point was years ago.”
It’s this quote that struck me most when I was reading this moving piece from a North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) paramedic this morning.
Penning an essay to explain why they are striking today - along with thousands of ambulance staff up and down the country - they say the service is 'past breaking point' and people are 'dying unnecessarily every day' because of it.
They claim the government is ‘using the media to try to divide us from the public we serve, to say we are greedy and compare our wages to yours, that is always their strategy’.
And they add: "I understand the argument that striking is dangerous and will put lives at risk, sadly people may even die. But the reality is, due to the understaffed, underpaid and overworked conditions and the inability to retain staff due to stagnated wages over the last 12 years, lives are ALREADY at risk, people are ALREADY dying unnecessarily. Every day.”
It’s a clear-eyed message and medics in all parts of the NHS have been repeating for months, if not years.
Reporter Tom George has been speaking to union members on the picket in Manchester this morning.
Among them was Steve McDonnell, an emergency medical technician with NWAS. He has had to turn to food banks recently and says it was a ‘difficult decision’ to strike as he ‘cannot afford to’.
Ann Sumner, based at Manchester Central ambulance station, said the government needs to understand how much hard work staff at the ambulance service actually do.
"Staff are dwindling because they are moving on to other jobs that are more well paid than we are. We are losing an awful amount of staff,” she said.
"The public at the moment are being put at risk. All we are asking is to be recognised - everyone went above and beyond during Covid. The Government thanked us then, why can't they thank us now and give us a decent pay rise?
"We take a patient in, and it's gridlock now because there is not enough staff in A&E. The patients then can't be moved to a ward. The patients can't be discharged because the health service is dwindling. It's about time the Government realised that."
Would it be the same if it happened today?
Among those supporting the striking ambulance workers is Greater Manchester Police Federation chair Lee Broadbent.
He has been quick to jump to the support of the ‘Green Angels’ today, sharing a tragic story about how paramedics and emergency call handlers helped him when his grandmother died seven years ago.
Tweeting about when she was taken seriously ill at home, Lee said a 999 call handler helped and ‘reassured’ him as he performed CPR and they waited for an ambulance.
"The ambulance crew found a heart beat and went to work… the brilliant #GreenAngels transported my grandma and grandad to hospital whilst I stayed behind to call my dad, his brothers and mop up the blood from the bathroom floor in the hope they’d return,” he wrote.
"A couple of hours later her sons were at her bedside. Painfully, my beloved grandma didn’t make it. BUT she died surrounded by love and that wouldn’t have been possible without the compassion, professionalism and dedication of the ambulance service, nurses and doctors."
Lee questioned if he would see a similar service today but says he would not blame the crew responding if not.
He instead laid the blame at the door of ‘senior politicians trying to hide years of mismanagement, under investment and a lack of political focus/economic management’.
He added: “I know first hand the compassion, professionalism and dedication my colleagues in green exemplify every day and indeed the tension/conflict taking strike action must exert on their sense of duty,” he wrote.
"But know this, every blue light service understands the pressure they are under and the internal conflict they’re battling with. We know they do not take this step lightly and that this action is not just about pay.”
Man living in hospital for over a year
One of the many things medics have been complaining about for months is the challenges in discharging patients who are well enough to leave.
So this story about a man in his 30s who has been living in hospital for more than a year is perhaps unsurprising, but nevertheless shocking.
As Paul Britton reports, the man has physical and mental health problems and is 'living' in a hospital even though he is fit to leave.
His details have not been shared, but the Court of Protection was told Manchester City Council has responsibilities for his care. Lawyers said he remains in hospital because no 'available alternative accommodation' had been found – even though a 'wide range of public authorities' are involved in his case.
Ben McCormack, representing the man, told Mr Justice Hayden he had tried to 'escape' through the ceiling of the bathroom attached to his ward and broke his arm.
He said the man has 'extensive health needs' which would need to be met outside hospital. “The real problem is that no available alternative accommodation has yet been sourced," he said.
Vikram Sachdeva KC, who represented one of the health authorities involved, told the judge: "We know the state that the health service and social care services are in. It is cold comfort to the individual, but the professionals do have that pressure."
Four in five properties affected by damp and mould
Almost 80 per cent of tenants on Awaab Ishak's estate whose homes were recently assessed have ‘signs of damp and mould’, a report has found.
Awaab died exactly two years ago, just days after his second birthday, after being exposed to damp and mould at his home on the Freehold Estate, in Rochdale.
Reporter Stephen Topping spoke to numerous families living on the estate last summer who described similar conditions at their homes, with children suffering breathing issues. That investigation prompted Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH) - which owns and manages the estate - to inspect every property.
The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) has now revealed that as many as four in five properties were affected by damp and mould that RBH was unaware of - with the worst cases amounting to a 'category one' hazard.
The housing group has been downgraded to 'G3', meaning it is not compliant with governance requirements.
A regulatory notice says ‘hundreds’ of properties on the estate have signs of damp and mould and adds: "We now know that almost 80 per cent of tenants on the Freehold Estate who have had their properties surveyed since summer 2022 have signs of damp and mould which RBH was not previously aware of. It is not clear why RBH was unaware of these problems given that they are widespread across the properties on the Freehold Estate."
The housing association says it is taking prompt action to rectify the failures highlighted.
The road to Wigan Pier
It looks like work to turn Wigan Pier into a wedding venue, gin distillery, microbrewery and food hall will start in 2023. Eight waterside townhouses are also due to be built there.
Developer Step Places hopes to start work in February.
As George Lythgoe reports, the landmark suffered years of neglect and the memory of its house music and rave scene was all that remained after a club at the site was torn down in 2014.
The pier was originally a loading jetty where wagons would pile coal onto barges bound for the Leeds-Liverpool Canal. George Orwell wrote about the difficult living conditions facing workers there in his famous 1937 novel.
Weather etc
- Thursday: Cloudy changing to light rain by late morning. 7C.
- Trains: Avanti has confirmed its Christmas Eve timetable, including the first and last trains between major cities. Read it here.
- Christmas cracker: Why is it best to think of 2022 like a panto?
Manchester headlines
- Sold: A landmark office building in Manchester city centre next to The Bridgewater Hall and The Midland Hotel has been sold to La Française Real Estate Managers from AEW for c.£47m. 101 Barbirolli Square has six upper floors and is fully let to multiple tenants. Peter Balfour, head of real estate UK for La Française Real Estate Managers, said: "Manchester has been a target market for some time, being a vibrant European city that is home to many successful national and international companies underpinned by a dynamic workforce."
- Masterplan: Oldham Council leader Amanda Chadderton has branded the massive Places for Everyone housing masterplan a ‘three-year waste of time and money’ in light of a potential government planning U-turn. Housing secretary Michael Gove has announced a consultation on a revised National Planning Policy Framework, starting before Christmas. He also confirmed that the long-standing target to build 300,000 homes a year would not be enforced, and would instead be considered ‘advisory’.
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Worst-hit: North West Ambulance Service has been named as the trust worst-hit by sickness absence rates due to long Covid. The data, gathered by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coronavirus, showed that between October 2021 and October this year, an estimated 166,760 calendar days were lost due to staff experiencing Covid-related sickness more than 28 days after contracting the virus. Of the trusts that responded, NWAS recorded the highest absence rate, with 42,281 days of absence taken due to long Covid over the period.
Worth a read
Wealthy residents have paid around £3m to live on Altrincham’s Broadway. So it’s perhaps no surprise that their homes are surrounded by imposing gates and fences. It was recently named the most expensive street in the North West, and reporter Louisa Gregson visited to ask locals what it’s like to live there.
As one homeowner told her: "Some people have insane levels of wealth and just because of that, they have so much security. Every bit of security has to be bulletproof. You have to be confident the glass can withhold a big hammer.
"Some people have one guard or more actually inside the house, physically monitoring CCTV cameras. Some home owners pay a company to monitor them. Security costs more than most people's annual wage but when you have hundreds of millions in the bank, it is necessary."
You can read the full piece here.
That's all for today
Thanks for joining me. If you have stories you would like us to look into, email beth.abbit@menmedia.co.uk.
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The answer to today's trivia question is: Because it's behind you.
