Officers’ Meeting 27th March 2012

Notes of officers meeting, SHA Wales, 27th March 2012

 

Present: Phillipa Ford, Alison Scouller, Tony Beddow

 

  1. Updates since AGM

 

  1. Phillipa had collected cheque book and bank details from Eifion. Paperwork was completed to ensure change of bank mandate. Noted, account had balance of £679.49p
  2. Tony Beddow had written to Treasury, Scottish Government and Welsh Government re the extra funding in England for PFI schemes and the Barnett consequentials. Replies had been received from Scotland and Treasury from which it seemed that this funding had been taken from the DH contingency fund which should already be reflected in Wales Barnett share. Agreed: secretary to pursue further the start and end figures for DH in 2011/12 to check Wales has been properly funded. Also to seek explanation of how the “freed” sum was deployed in Wales.

 

  1. Feedback from Central Council meeting

 

TB reported back; two key issues i) the English campaign against the “reforms” and ii) the expectation that the result of the Mid Staffs enquiry would have profound consequences. These were likely to highlight the corrosive effect of management chasing financial targets at the expense of clinical ones. (In Wales “vacancy management” was already thought to be causing problems). Next Council was June 23rd, either AS or TB would attend.

 

  1. Possible programme

 

Discussed: arranging a meeting with Lesley Griffiths to cover three topics – the need to ensure Wales performance data was comparable to England’s; maintaining appropriate professional standards during the re-structuring process; having a clear rationale for using the private and voluntary sectors. Agreed: TB to seek a date.

 

Discussed: possibility of organising a public meeting to alert the public (and NHS staff) to the implications of the English NHS reforms. There would need to be a clear focus for this – for example cross border issues, or the wider political significance.     

 

Discussed: whether we should revive the annual Nye Bevan lecture, and if so where, when and on what topic. (TB to consider further)

 

Noted: the event suggested by David Smith was now unlikely to be possible given the commitments of the visitor.

 

  1. Other business
  1. a) CLP affiliations: AS raised the reason for affiliations to CLPs and TB explained the past practice. Only a few CLPs were selected for affiliation where we had active SHA members willing to be involved in broader party matters. It was agreed to let current arrangements stand.
  2. b) Membership list : noted; the membership list supplied by Martin seemed dated. Agreed: TB to link with MR to see if the list could be updated.
  3. c) Agreed: TB to alert Wales Labour to the names and contact details of the new officers.

 

 

Date of next meeting was agreed as Tuesday 29th May at 4pm at Sarne services.