Extra GP capacity won’t fix social care problems
Reference the story headlined ‘Plans submitted for new high-spec health centre’ (Newbury Weekly News, June 6).
Of course we need more GP capacity for an area that is going to have a large increase in patients due to the proposals in the new Local Plan Review.
However there are dire shortages in social care that currently cannot be delivered with quality by your GP or the local NHS at the community hospital or adult social care.
So let’s have a clear picture painted of what services it will actually deliver then we can see if any of the current gaps are filled.
Paula Saundersonvia the Newburytoday Facebook page
I was so proud to take D-Day veteran to France
I have just seen the article on Mr Cecil Newton.
I had the honour and privilege to take him and other veterans to France and Holland when I was a coach driver in the 90s working for a Swindon company.
They were all nice polite gentlemen.
I felt very proud and humble to be taking these heroes to remembrance services, and hear their interesting stories.
MG HewerKent
Find a newt or a bat to thwart Sandleford plan
I enjoyed your piece on Sandleford’s past (Newbury Weekly News, May 30), but hasn’t anyone found a great crested newt or rare bat yet to thwart the developers?
Even a skeleton in a trench might indicate recent activity.
Just saying.
Tom BrownGore End
Laura Farris voted so badly on water quality
I have recently had an email from Laura Farris’s office to say she is no longer my MP, however she was for the last four-and-a-half years, so I feel I can comment on her voting patterns and speeches.
One problem that has beset Newbury in the past year has been the excessive rain which according to the Environment Agency was 40 per cent higher in the last year and has put our sewerage system under severe pressure.
Mrs Farris is reported as “generally voting against measures to prevent climate change” as well as four specific votes on environmental water quality.
Mrs Farris made three speeches in the House Of Commons on February 2020, January 2021 and July 2021, all about the River Kennet, and then in October 2021 voted three times against measures that would have raised standards as well as against the principal the polluter pays.
I really wonder if she would have voted that way if she was not following the orders of her party.
Whatever happens I believe that she inadvertently makes the case for independent MPs not tied to the party machine antics or for parties with clear environmental agendas.
It is interesting is that Steve Masters (Green Party candidate) recently put a Facebook page out about a situation very similar to Hampstead Norreys in a Wiltshire constituency.
Upon checking the Wiltshire constituency I found out that their Conservative MP did not vote with the Government on the infamous October 20 vote, neither did he vote with the opposition – he abstained.
Mrs Farris did not have to vote the way she did.
Ian HallAshampstead
Voting for party MPs cancels democracy
Never call a party MP ‘my MP’.
They are chosen by the party for the primary purpose of playing party-games in the Westminster Gaming Chambers.
Every MP swears sole (note that word) allegiance to monarchy – and none to you.
A party MP is a gaudy bloom on a hollow stem.
When you make that ‘X’ mark, you cancel democracy, integrity and hope for another five years.
Barrie SingletonRiver Walk, Shaw
