YORK Press recently reported a distressing situation for an expectant mother who arrived at the York NHS Trust to give birth to find she could not be admitted to the maternity unit as it was over capacity and the family was faced with a journey to another unit.

Unfortunately situations like these are becoming increasingly common around the rest of the country.

Concerned Midwives and Mothers in York are staging a rally Save a Service in Crisis on Sunday at 2pm outside York Minster to draw attention to this worrying situation and they hope to gain public support for urgent action.

There are 74 protests taking place simultaneously in cities throughout the UK.

Gwen Vardigans,

Carron Crescent, York

 

Council's "heartless policy"​

I WAS pleased to see The Press devoting several pages to the devastating impact that the council's ban on blue badge parking is having on disabled people (The Press, 16 November).

Like Natasha Rawnsley, I suffer from MS and totally identify with her when she says "My city has been stolen from me".

Since the blue badge ban was introduced I can no longer visit much of the city centre on my own. I fail to understand why this council is so keen to rob disabled people of their independence.

I also find it extremely objectionable that the council is now claiming that the blue badge ban is necessary to stop terrorist attacks.

Everyone understands that it might be necessary to have additional temporary restrictions at busy times. But it is nonsense to claim that a permanent ban on blue badge parking is needed to keep York safe from attack. The council are just coming up with new excuses to justify their heartless policy.

Sue Fowler

Albemarle Road, York

 

Levelling up - or grinding down over Universal Credit cut?

AS it is the season for screeching U-turns perhaps our member of parliament would like to take the opportunity afforded by his government’s reversal of policies on sewage pollution and corrupt MPs to execute his own handbrake turn on Universal Credit.

When Mr Hollinrake gave his impassioned justification of the righteousness of taking £20 from the poorest families he may have been banking on Rishi Sunak to restore social justice through his autumn budget. It was rumoured that he would; in the interests of levelling up.

But when the dust settled on the budget, after the jolly scenes in parliament and Tory celebrations in Westminster pubs, it was revealed that the rescue was a sham. Respected independent researchers at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and The Resolution Foundation calculated the net effect of inflation and all the government changes affecting those on Universal Credit.

They found that of those in work three quarters were still worse off than if Universal Credit had not been cut. Those not in work were not helped at all by Mr Sunak’s jiggery pokery and remain £1,040 worse off each year.

In Thirsk and Malton therefore the 3,500 households on Universal Credit and not in work will now take the full £1,040 hit to their annual income. 2,250 of those households in work but on Universal Credit due to low pay will also be worse off.

The government advice seems to be, don’t ask us to run the economy fairly, get a better job. A variant of blame the victim. Norman Tebbit will be proud.

Now that the figures have been clarified Mr Hollinrake has a chance to point to the real problem. Universal Credit is simply set too low to prevent grinding poverty, Covid or no Covid. So what is he for? Levelling up or grinding down. I think the solution is to raise benefits to adequate levels comparable with equivalent Western European democracies. What does he think?

Mick Johnston,

Main Street, Ebberston

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