Elections

• General Election 2001
  • Sources
  • Wyre Forest
    • Sources
• Devolved and Local Elections 2003
• Local Elections 2006

In Wyre Forest District Council, for the second consecutive year in May 2000, most of the councillors were elected in support of Health Concern, a campaign to save the Kidderminster Hospital. Although the District Council has no statutory responsibility for the hospital, voters are making their views known in the only way they can. How much better if they could vote for the Health Authority. Health Concern contested the 2001 General Election. The election of Dr Richard Taylor as the Health Concern Member of Parliament for Wyre Forest along with six Health Concern members of Worcestershire County Council is a welcome message to the Government about the democratic deficit in the Health Service. See Richard Taylor Guardian Tuesday May 22, 2001, Guardian Society Thursday May 17, 2001 , Guardian Wednesday May 23, 2001, Guardian Saturday June 9, 2001 .

The low turnout in the 2001 General Election nationally is a sign of public alienation from both the main parties. Sharron Storer berating the Prime Minister on a visit to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham shows clearly the lack of local democratic accountability in the Health Service. Her willingness to make her own election issue and seize the media's attention is a positive feature of the election campaign.

• Swapping patients for parliament. One doctor is so outraged by the government's reforms that he is seriously considering standing for parliament to try to save his local hospital. Dr Barry Monk, a dermatologist at Bedford Hospital, has threatened to stand as an MP at the next election under a Save Bedford Hospital banner. Bedford is one of 19 hospitals in the East facing an uncertain future after the East of England Strategic Health Authority said it was considering centralising some of its key services in "super" hospitals. It could mean that Bedford, which serves 300,000 people, loses some of its more high-profile services such as A& E and intensive care. "The problem is that once you start taking services, the rest just withers away. I can see a point where the hospital just ceases to operate. Doctors are fed up with this constant meddling in the health service and my message to politicians is that if they won't stop interfering in the NHS, we will start interfering with the cosy world of politics. Taking services away is not in the best interests of patients or the local community. Doctors are not against change, in fact we have been at the forefront of many, it is just that I don't see that this is a positive move." Summary by Keep our NHS Public of BBC Online 19 September 2006