Hospital deserves better parking for staff and patients
I AGREE with the reader who in Your Views recently suggested that staff at Stepping Hill deserve better in terms of parking.
I believe in fact that they should not be paying parking fees to subsidise our health care at all.
She then suggested that instead of fining people for incorrect parking, that resources should be used to retrieve money from people from abroad who use the hospital when they are not entitled to do so.
I wonder however, how many such people do use the hospital and leave without paying.
This topic was brought up by a member of the public at a recent board meeting at Stepping Hill.
The person asked about how much money was not retrieved from people from abroad and whether the hospital was going to introduce the use of passports to prove eligibility.
The reply from one of the board members suggested that it was not a big issue and that he had been surprised to learn that there had been refugees staying in a Stockport hotel because they had not used the hospital.
I worry that it is easy to scapegoat people ‘from abroad’ when the problems of the NHS are down to the Conservative government and the lack of funding of our health and social care.
It is wrong that our hospitals have to rely on parking charges to fund care.
The government is set to destroy the NHS and introduce privatisation as an alternative.
Migrants are being blamed for many problems in the UK, these issues will be discussed at the launch meeting of Stand Up To Racism: Stockport on February 21 at the Quaker Meeting House, Cooper Street, Stockport at 7.30pm. Jack Wrigley, Bramhall, on behalf of Stand Up To Racism land, as a twice daily visitor to the land in question to tend to my own animals I felt compelled to give my views.
Yes I know we need housing for young people, AFFORDABLE housing, but so many in such a relatively small area?
If building goes ahead for so many homes where will the then homeless wildlife go?
The numerous badgers, foxes, hares, rabbits, stoats, weasels and smaller rodents.
Where will the buzzards roost? The little owls? What of the common and great crested newts in the local ponds? The toads and frogs?
What of the hedgehogs, already so often crushed beneath the unforgiving wheels of the already rising numbers of motorists on the overcrowded road network.
The lapwings, already decreasing in numbers due to new farming practises.
Shall we lose them all together along with the once numerous yellowhammers?
Where will people go to refresh their minds and bodies?
Where will farmers graze their cattle and sheep to feed the increased population?
I have the answer! Leave the greenbelt just as it is. Instead, put the proposed new builds on the golf course!
It’s much nearer the newly built link road, with alternative golf courses at both Stockport and Marple, it’s got to be a win-win situation and would show if they are really serious about their greenbelt.
Alternatively, they could go ahead with the building and just graze their livestock on the golf course. J Boulillier Address supplied world stops yet we still want it. Jim Heyworth Shaw Heath