Our Hospital

The quality of care at Southend University Hospital is experiencing a continued decline. According to the Southend Echo, there are plans to “re-designate” Southend Hospital’s neonatal unit. This change would result in premature babies born before 32 weeks being transferred to either Basildon or Broomfield hospitals for care, rather than remaining at Southend. Home cancer treatments are being suspended and worst of all, 600 jobs are being cut. This is to tackle a £100m deficit. Why is there a deficit? Not enough money from the government or mismanagement? 24 Hour Accidents and Emergencies should not be how the hospital functions!

I received an alert on the 17th of May to say Southend University Hospital was being inspected. Last July’s inspection had an overall rating of “Requires Improvement”. That’s like failing an MOT quite badly. The results will take about 2 months, but if it was this month, we’d have been in the bottom quarter. Essex Live reported: “Pipes were leaking in rooms where a patient was being nursed, more than 200 pieces of equipment needed reviewing and in Southend Hospital there were more than 700 repair jobs that needed finishing”

Nothing should come before our health and care in terms of priorities. HMRC collected £827.7 billion in taxes in 2023 to 2024, an increase of 5.0% from the year before. Where is it going?