Whistleblower backs Express crusade to divert cash to NHS
A WHISTLEBLOWER in the Mid Staffs NHS care scandal whose mother died in the tragedy is backing our crusade to divert billions of foreign aid to the NHS.
Julie Bailey said a policy that meant £13.3billion of taxpayers’ cash was spent overseas was a “kick in the teeth to a generation who deserved better”.
Hundreds of patients died due to a catalogue of failings and costcutting between January 2005 and March 2009, with elderly and frail patients left without food and water and abandoned in soiled bedclothes.
Ms Bailey’s whistleblowing account of “chaos” at Stafford Hospital, run by Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, shocked millions and led to a public inquiry. Her mother Bella Bailey died at Stafford Hospital in 2007 and Ms Bailey set up campaign group Cure The NHS.
She said: “It doesn’t seem right we can send money in foreign aid, yet we can’t keep NHS patients safe. I back the Express campaign as the time has come to think of our own first.” Her mother was admitted to Stafford Hospital, since renamed County Hospital, in 2007 with an enlarged hernia.
She collapsed after being left without oxygen. Ms Bailey spent the next eight weeks staying with her mother until she died, aged 86. She said: “In her final days my mother suffered horrendously at the hands of those who should have cared for her.
“The NHS is critical and we need urgent funding. We have a workforce crisis looming, staff morale at an all-time low, a huge increase in patients and not enough funding.
“I fear that, without funding, no lessons will have been learned from the Mid-Staffs disaster.”
Ms Bailey’s concerns come as support for the Daily Express Stop The Foreign Aid Madness crusade – backed by 70,000 readers – continues to grow.
Our campaign calls on the Government to spend more taxpayers’ money on alleviating chronic cash shortages in the NHS, elderly services and social care. The health service faces a recruitment crisis with a shortage of 50,000 doctors and nurses.
NHS hospitals and ambulance trusts recorded a deficit of more than £700million in the last financial year with about 100 of 235 trusts in the red.
To back our crusade, go to: https://petition.parliament.uk/ petitions/200292