A Caring Conservative?

[ianch99]

Tory MP's filibuster blocks bill to give carers free hospital parking

Shame

[denphone]

There are caring Conservative's out there but alas he is not one of them.

[Taf]

"I pledge to speak up for Carers in parliament".

Rentaquote populist douchebag.

Originally Posted by Hugh

Rentaquote populist douchebag.

[techguyone]

It's a cheap tactic & should be banned from anyone using it, if debates needed let it happen, it's like being back in the playground

[arcimedes]

Originally Posted by techguyone

It's a cheap tactic & should be banned from anyone using it, if debates needed let it happen, it's like being back in the playground

Except that it is open to any member to propose that the vote be taken on the bill. They just have to get around 100 members to vote. One could come to the conclusion that there wasn't that much support for the bill and tactic avoids having to actually say you don't want the bill.

[techguyone]

Yes I understand that, what I don't get at all, is why there needs to be *any* car park charges for going to hospital, nor why that should be perceived as a cost to the NHS if the charges get dropped. No one goes to hospital for a jolly, they're there because they have to be, they're not going there to shop.

I especially don't understand why any MP of any political party would want to block such a bill, we'll see how they feel when they get a member of their family who gets chronically ill periodically & spends vast amounts of time in a hospital.

[Taf]

At our local hospital it went like this:

Free parking.
Vandalism and theft from a few cars.
Security guards brought in.
Charges started to pay for security guards.
Blue badge cars exempt.
Vandalism and theft from a few cars.
More security guards brought in.
Charges increased to pay for more security guards.
Blue badge cars to pay, but allowed double the time limit.
Vandalism and theft from a few cars.
More security guards and CCTV brought in.
Charges increased to pay for more security guards and CCTV.
Blue badge cars given their own car park, charged at the same rate as all other parking.
Private company brought in to build multistorey car park.
Charges increased to pay for more security guards, CCTV and new multistorey car park.
Welsh Assembly scraps car parking fees, except where new parking areas and structures had been built and needed to be paid off even if you did not park in those new areas or structures.
New parking areas and structures started to be built at many hospitals, charges instigated.

[arcimedes]

More or less like that in Oxford except for the scrapping of charges as we aren't in Wales. Charges were introduced to stop commuters from parking and filling up all the spaces. Now the bus services are very good and you don't need to drive there so much though I have noticed that when the ticket machines fail the car parks suddenly become full.

[nomadking]

1) The hospitals can each set their own rules, so no new law needed.
2) If it's so simple, why didn't Labour introduce it? Why didn't the Labour MPs complain then?
3) In the examples given it has always just been about VISITING. Why should "official" carers get preferential treatment to VISIT. The caring is done by the hospital. Why should they get preferential treatment over "non-official" carers or family members?

[Gary L]

Hospitals are pathetic for parking anyway.

take the 'new' QE Hospital in Birmingham. they designed the main entrance to be impossible for cars. all this rubbish about encouraging people to catch a bus and walk. ooh save the world hippy stuff!

do they catch the bus and walk to work?
no.

it's got that bad there now that the one road is for all cars including double deckers. and cars dropping people off in wheel chairs and stuff deliberately take their time and block the whole road off. and it's common knowledge that they do this by way of a protest of the way that they designed it.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by techguyone

Yes I understand that, what I don't get at all, is why there needs to be *any* car park charges for going to hospital, nor why that should be perceived as a cost to the NHS if the charges get dropped

Who pays for the car park to be secured and maintained? If you drop car park charges in hospitals, how are you going to stop people just parking up and "nipping in to Sainsburys"? How would you stop people parking up then walking to the local station to get the train to work? Tickets might work, but the hospital staff would need to issue them as if people just had to go to a machine, they could just get the ticket, display it then sod off to do whatever. At least if they are charged, there is a chance fewer people will try it..

BTW, don't think motorists would nick a car parking space in a medical establishment to nip to Sainsburys? Wrong.. My doctor's surgery is in a large converted house, and a few years ago, they paved over the front garden as a car park for the surgery staff. This car park is frequently filled with cars whose owners have just nipped to Sainsburys. This Sainsburys is actually next door and has two council owned car parks - one immediately behind it and one in the next road (a 1 minute walk). There are a lot of people who will go for something they don't have to pay for, even if it causes massive problems for someone else.

The doctors had a small automatic gate to stop people doing this, but people kept driving into it, and eventually it got to the point where it was not apparently economical to repair it.

[Arthurgray50@blu]

I think its poor and pathetic that PRIVATE car parks are run by companies that claim all the money that is earned is poured into the hospital - total rubbish

At West Middlesex Hospital just up the road from me, the charges are 2.50 per hour. When l was there several years ago. My wife had to pay £9.00 for the visit.

Ealing Hospital charges are £5 quid - l would not have minded if the charge was going to the hospital or paying for staff to park there, as they are charged, which l find scandalous.

Someone is ripping off patients and families of the sick

[Osem]

We have exactly that problem. We are close to a massively expensive LABOUR conceived PFI hospital which has crammed a lot of hospital onto a too small site by building housing on what would have been hospital grounds and car parking. The result is not enough parking for the staff/visitors coupled with oressure from commuters etc. who'd happily park all day of they could. The only way to control parking is to levy a charge to exclude those who'd happily leave their cars all day.

Not only that but because the demands was significantly underestimated for some inexplicable reason, the little remaining care parking/open space has been built upon to provide additional services/offices, merely adding to the problem.

The fact is that any hospital close to significant services/amenities/transport links and which provides free parking is liable to be full of people who aren't actually using the service.