Matrons not the answer

4.57.25pm GMT Fri 18th Feb 2005

Graham Oakes has criticised the Tories health policy as being "superficial and designed to distract from the truth".

The Tories have announced they intend to bring back Matrons and give them the power to close dirty wards.

"If this wasn't so important it would be farcical. The reason why wards are dirtier now than when I did my Nurse training is because of the fragmentation and under-funding of the NHS - which is the Tories fault!"

"Pretending that Matrons will be able to solve the problems is to deliberately mislead the public. Clearly nurses need to have a bigger say in the running of our hospitals but the Tories have misdiagnosed the problem and hence have come up with the wrong prescription."

"Hospital wards are dirty because the so-called health reforms the Tories brought in under Margaret Thatcher fragmented the NHS, massively increased the number of bureaucrats and reduced the money spent on cleaning when it was privatised."

"Labour has put more money into the NHS but has continued with the Tory policy of Trusts. They continued the purchaser/provider split and fixated on targets."

"Now the Tories want to spend less, expand privatisation and close dirty wards instead of cleaning them!"

"The NHS is definitely not safe in Howard's hands!"

Note to Editors: Graham Oakes is a trained Nurse who worked in the NHS from 1984 to 1994, before becoming a Matron running Nursing Homes. Today he is a manager of a Homecare company.

ENDS