Something to say about health services?
With an ageing population, more people accessing services and continued funding pressures, local health services are under more pressure than ever before. What we do to address these challenges is one of the most important issues facing local and national decision makers.
We want to know your views. Is there something about health services in Lambeth you think is really important? Do you have an opinion about integrating health and social care, or lifting the strain on A&E departments? Should we focus more on prevention? What would you like to see by 2024? Here’s your chance to get an answer from the people who run Lambeth Council.
Following the really successful full council around youth and young people back in July, we’re again asking you to suggest questions you’d like answered at Lambeth’s next full council on 19 November.
You can send in questions or even come along and pose them yourself if you fancy a trip to the historic council chambers in Lambeth’s Town Hall in Brixton.
How to ask your question
Post your questions below, or tweet us @Lambeth_Council using the hashtag #LambethQuestionTime
You can also submit a short statement to be read out at the meeting to contribute to the debate and tell the council what you want to see happen. Email your statement to us, max 500 words, at webteam@lambeth.gov.uk.
Even if you don’t get your questions answered on the 19th, Lambeth councillors will answer all of them on this blog after the meeting.
Get your questions and statements in to us by midnight on Friday 14 November
If you want to come along to the full council meeting, email leader@lambeth.gov.uk
Get more involved – comment on decisions in your area
Lambeth is a cooperative and open council and we want more residents involved in decision making, whether that’s deciding how services or delivered, or even what services we should be offering.
There are many ways to do this – in July we talked about how you could join the Youth Council, this time we want to highlight how you can comment on consultations about decisions and changes in your local area.
There is a huge amount of regeneration happening in Lambeth – whether that’s the Vauxhall and Nine Elms development, or Future Brixton, or looking at the future of Clapham Leisure centre.
You can find out more about what’s happening in your area on our website including opportunities to comment and get involved in council redevelopment.
Or you can sign up to our email newsletter to make sure you never miss the chance to have your say – sign up at https://love.lambeth.gov.uk/newsletters/
And don’t forget to ask your questions about health – go ahead and comment below.
Hi all
This would be my first time to leave a comment on Love Lambeth but just realised that all the posts seem to be for 2014 and none for 2015/16. Is this still functional?? Could I still send a post and get a response?
Hi Olive,
Although this particular Council meeting has passed, we are currently consulting on our Public Health Services at http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/PHSconsultation
Anyone can share their ideas and all ideas will be considered by the council as it designs/redesigns the proposals for public health services in Lambeth.
Bianca Swalem – Transformation Team at Guy’s & St Thomas’ Hospital Trust has asked:
‘I work in the Guy’s & St Thomas’ Hospital Trust where we are looking into new ways of providing healthcare. I’m preparing a study which includes an analysis of how beneficial accessing healthcare through internet enabled devices would be to the local population of Lambeth and Southwark. The initial phase we would like to run would focus on video-conferencing.
This involves a healthcare professional holding a face to face video consultation with the patient who remains at home, instead of coming into the hospital. It would be a supplement to care and not a complete replacement for all hospital visits.
In order to progress with the study we would need to gain an accurate picture of internet access / use in the two boroughs especially among the elderly. We are also interested in the attitudes and openness of residents to accessing healthcare in this way.
I must stress that this is a very early stage analysis that should be viewed within the same time framework as your ‘What should Lambeth’s health service look like in 2024’ debate.
What does the cabinet think of using web technology in this way for healthcare? Would you be supportive of this idea in Lambeth, and how do you think it would be received by residents?’
At the full council meeting, Adrian McLachlan, Chair of Lambeth NHS CCG said new technology is important but is only a small part of the overall picture. It is important not to ignore low-tech solutions too. They are currently introducing new technology at Guys and St Thomas’s but the coverage at the moment is admittedly patchy.
He said it was vital to make the use of technology the norm and always ensure vigilance about the equalities impact, for e.g in relation to people with learning disabilities.
Cllr Jim Dickson, Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing, added that Lambeth’s £30m investment in older people’s housing will embed modern technology in the design of the new accommodation.
At it’s council meeting in July why did Lambeth Councillors vote to remove references in a council motion to the estimate of over 100 deaths each year linked to poor air quality in Lambeth, made by Public Health England?
The Cabinet’s response:
Public Health England’s estimate that 112 deaths per year were attributable to long-term air pollution exposure, was based in part on 7 year old data and it appreciated that air quality across the UK has improved considerably in that time.
We accept however that there is much more that can be done at a local, regional, national and international level in order that standards continue to rise.
Lambeth is in the process of applying for Cleaner Air Borough status, which will enable us to bid for funds from the Mayor for innovative projects designed to improve air quality. Lambeth is committed to a borough-wide 20MPH speed limit; the significant encouragement and enabling of greater and safer cycling participation; and tremendous investment in tree planting and general ‘greening’ of Lambeth’s neighbourhoods.
We already have a number of initiatives to help reduce pollutants and improve air quality, such as controlled parking zones priced according to the emissions of your vehicle and green roofs, depaving and rain gardens, all of which help to reduce airborne pollutants.
Hello! I have a question I’d like to ask, please.
According to your press release (http://lambethenvironment.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/lambeth-recycling-rate-soars/) since August 2011 you have been incinerating all black bin bag waste at the incinerator in Bexley. Given the obvious negative impact on health from the air pollution, why does Lambeth do this?
The Cabinet’s response:
The management of waste is tightly controlled in England – Lambeth collects waste, but is part of a statutory Joint Waste Partnership and must, by law, deliver the waste it collects to our waste disposal authority (Western Riverside Waste Authority). Our waste was previously being sent to landfill – the most environmentally destructive form of waste treatment and local authorities have to meet legally binding targets to reduce the landfilling of biodegradable waste. As such, WRWA signed a 30-year contract with Cory Environmental in 2002 for alternative forms of waste treatment. Numerous studies were conducted by consultants and a modern energy-from-waste plant emerged as the only viable technology available able to handle the volumes of waste involved.
The contract is structured such that we do not need to deliver a minimum quantity of waste; a new recycling sorting plant at Smugglers Way also formed part of the deal; and the pricing structure means the four constituent councils are heavily incentivised financially to reduce waste and divert rubbish into recycling schemes. The location of the facility means that the waste can be transported there by barge along the Thames, saving tens of thousands of lorry movements each year. The outputs from the plant are taken by barge to recycling facilities and all the bottom ash is reused or recycled. We are now also recycling the ash from the chimneys. As a modern facility it is subject to stringent emission standards and details on the emissions can be found on the RRRL website.
All waste treatment processes have an impact on the environment. Materials sorted for recycling have to be trucked, often for significant distances, by heavily polluting diesel HGVs. Our energy-from-waste plant is local, generates electricity (displacing fossil fuels) and all solid outputs are recycled. The emissions to air from the efw plant are negligible when compared to the pollution load from vehicles, construction sites and heating systems. For example, during October 2014 the plant was emitting 0.2ug/m3 of particulates on average. On Brixton High Street however, particulate emissions currently average 28ug/m3.
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