The Photo Boris Johnson Didn't Want To See

Vote Labour to put an end to the willful destruction of our NHS that resulted in four-year-old Jack Williment-Barr being forced to lie on the floor of his local hospital whilst awaiting treatment.

We are the third richest country in the world, and this is how we treat the sick and vulnerable. Do more than Boris Johnson; look at this photograph and consider the words of the UN report "Considering the significant resources available in the country and sustained and widespread cuts to social support, which have resulted in significantly worse outcomes, the policies pursued since 2010 amount to regressive measures in clear violation of the country's human rights obligations"

The Tories have had nine years to recover from a global economic crash they continue to erroneously blame Labour for. When they've had that long and still done nothing, how can anyone believe them when they say they will right these wrongs now? How can anyone believe them when they refuse to even look at photographic evidence of such wrongs and dismiss the UN's findings as inaccurate. How can anyone believe the intentions of a party who, when confronted with this photo, resorted to spreading lies and smears to cover their own hides?

To make the change we need, to stop our children and the sick and the vulnerable from suffering, vote Labour on Thursday. 

Laura Kuenssberg's Spreads Misinformation, Again

The big news story today of course is the fact that Jack Williment-Barr, a four year old boy with suspected pneumonia, was forced to lie upon a pile of coats on the floor at Leeds General hospital. An utterly tragic state of affairs that can only be changed by voting Labour on Thursday. 

Twitter knows that this is today's big story, because a video of Joe Pike from ITV Calendar's attempting to hold our alleged PM Boris Johnson to account about this has been watched by (at the time of writing) 4.8m people.

One person on Twitter however refuses to acknowledge that this is today's big story and that person is Laura Kuenssberg, the alleged political editor from the equally alleged impartial public service broadcaster, the BBC. Kuenssberg's refusal stems from the fact that this story is damaging for the Conservative government. So what does she do instead? She proceeds to spread outright lies and smears about activists bussed, at Labour's expense, to Leeds Hospital to confront the Health Secretary Matt Hancock. More, she claimed that one of Hancock's advisors was physically attacked by one such advisor. Why did she do this? Because the Tories told her too. Because it would damage the Labour party. Robert Peston also swallowed the lie and quickly, dutifully spread it around Twitter.

But none of this was actually true. Subsequent video footage shows no hundred of activists (and how can you know for certain that they had been transported by Labour anyway?) and no punch. 

Once again, Laura Kuenssberg has swallowed whatever her 'senior Tory source' has told her to report. How many more times must we complain about this blatant propaganda masquerading as political journalism? I'm afraid we must do so once more at least. Please make a complaint to the BBC, let them know that this kind of behaviour from their staff cannot be tolerated. We pay a licence fee for impartial news, not to simply repeat the fantasies of the Conservative government. We need a promise that this mysterious 'senior Tory source' will no longer be listened toby their news team. More, we need that source to be identified. We also need Kuenssberg to apologise and resign. If she refuses to, then she should be sacked.

What Kuenssberg, and Peston, have done here is similar to the despicable stance The S*n took when reporting about the Hillsborough tragedy. The establishment have fed them a line that suits their own interest and rather than investigate it like real journalists would, they have simply reported it as fact. The S*n now sells less than 2,000 copies on Merseyside per day as a result of such slanderous smears. Is boycotting the BBC the way forward?

Why Jeremy Corbyn - Vote Labour on Thursday

This weekend I thought I'd try and put something into words that would hopefully answer the kind of questions you hear from people who may right now be undecided about who to vote for on Thursday. My intention here was to bloggerise some of the experiences I've had canvassing and, just like I've attempted to do face to face, alleviate any concerns that people may have about the Labour party or Jeremy Corbyn and reassure them that the most sensible thing to do this week is to vote Labour.

Then I saw that that excellent protest singer and beautiful comrade Grace Petrie had already done this on Facebook and far, far better than I could ever have hoped to. So please, just go and read that instead.

What I will add is that there seems to be this idea that Boris Johnson will, as he is always telling us, 'Get Brexit Done'. He won't. As Boris Johnson has consistently proven, he cannot be taken at his word. He lies, he cheats or he simply moves the goalposts. John Major knows that Johnson cannot deliver on Brexit. But the simple truth is that we cannot trust Boris Johnson on anything (and we certainly cannot trust him with the NHS) so why place your trust in him on Brexit? Far better to vote Labour. They will get a significantly better deal and they will put it to the people. If you still want Brexit, vote for that deal. If you don't want Brexit, vote to remain. Simple.

Please do not vote for a fascist who believes inequality is essential in our society. He says this because he knows he has had the good fortune to be born into privilege. Boris Johnson believes in inequality so much that his party have said that people with learning difficulties should be paid less because "they don't understand money". His party repeatedly deny they are racist and, when they are caught out being racist, they refuse to apologise - yet they intend to give the police greater laws in removing Roma families and traveller camps. Just like Hitler did. 

Why vote for that, when you can vote for a party that wants everyone to have better lives, more pay, more leisure time and a healthcare service that is free at the point of use for all?

Vote Labour on Thursday...or, if you live in a contested marginal, vote tactically for the best way to keep the Tories from returning to power.

Let's not wake up on Friday regretting the opportunity we had to make our country a better place for all.

It's Our NHS, Let's Keep It That Way

Voting Conservative next month is essentially voting to end the NHS as we know it.

As we saw tonight in the ITV debate between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn, Johnson cannot be trusted with the NHS. Labour sought a freedom of information request for the under-the-table negotiations between Johnson's Tory government and Trump's government in the US...and the almost the whole document was redacted. Despite his constant protestations that the NHS is not for sale, Boris Johnson is, once again, lying through his teeth.

Johnson also took the opportunity to lie to the ITV audience by wheeling out the 'we are building 40 new hospitals' line again and again tonight. Did I say line? I should really say lie.

The Tory government are only committing to funding six NHS trusts with hospitals in desperate need of rebuilding. A further 21 have been allocated 'seed funding', but this would not come to fruition for at least a decade. Around the time it will take Boris Johnson to secure a trade deal with the US.

But don't take my word for it. Listen to this passionate and eloquent medical student here, who dared to ask Boris Johnson a question when he arrived at her hospital for a PR stunt under a phalanx of security and secrecy.

And the debate itself? Well ITV conducted a poll immediately after it and Jeremy Corbyn came out as the most popular based on his performance by 78% to Johnson's paltry 22%.

Be part of the 78%. Vote Labour next month and give the NHS not only the future it deserves but the opportunity to care for us in that future.

Election

So we're set to go to the polls on December 12th and it is imperative that we use this opportunity to bring a Labour government to the victory.

Boris Johnson is trying to say that this election is about everything other than his Brexit plan, but it's not working. He wanted to say it was an election about law and order, but his '20,000 more police officers on the beat' claims have been skewered by the clear reality that it was the Tory/Lib Dem coalition government who systematically reduced police numbers by 21,000. Even with these 20,000 promised, there will still be a shortage. And that's not counting natural wastage to, like retirements and resignations. Simply put, the Tories are trying and failing to put right the wrongs they have already made, and in a very half arsed fashion. This was beautifully brought into the harsh glare of the spotlight this morning by Susanna Reid's grilling of health secretary Matt Hancock on Good Morning Britain.

So today, Boris Johnson attended PMQ's and seemed to want to make his election all about the NHS instead. But there's another flaw here; his government have just been caught out engaging in secret, under-the-table trade talks with Trump that will carve up our NHS. Watching the shameless Johnson stand there and attempt to berate Jeremy Corbyn about the NHS, a Labour leader who was personally integral in getting a cystic fibrosis drug onto the NHS last week because a young boy crippled with the condition had written to him, after his pleas to the Tory government went unheard, was nothing short of disgraceful. My only worry of course is that people will be gullible enough to still vote Conservative. But I ask you, who is our NHS better served by? A leader who listens to those who use it and feel neglected and proactively does something positive to change that person's life, or a leader who wants to sell it off wholesale to private US pharma companies? Boris Johnson knows that a handcuffs deal with the US will actually raise the NHS drug budget, crippling the service into further debt that it will be inevitable to privatise the whole thing. He knows this, because that's exactly what he wants - and end to a free NHS as we know it.

I'll be saying this a lot between now and December. Make sure you have a vote, and use it wisely - vote Labour.

BBC Bias: Sack Laura Kuenssberg

I've lost count of the amount of times I've written complaints to the BBC on their political bias and how they are effectively the Tory government's propaganda machine rather than a supposed impartial public service, but today they reached a new low. Laura Kuenssberg's decision to orchestrate a twitter dogpile on the worried father of a seriously ill newborn daughter because he had the audacity to confront our alleged Prime Minister about how his government is destroying the NHS is disgusting. There is NO excuse for attempting to add to this man's trauma by encouraging far right activists to troll him online.

And so what if that father votes Labour? His political affiliations do not matter here, what matters is he feels his baby is not being adequately treated and he has firsthand experience of seeing how the lack of government funding is a serious factor in the shortcomings of his daughter's treatment. Not being a Tory does not make his experience any less valid, and he was right to call out Johnson for his publicity stunt and we all saw this disgraceful dictator stupidly, blatantly lie on camera when he said that there was no press in attendance.

The irony today is that I can't complain about this to the BBC, because their complaints site is crashing under the weight of incoming missives from people who feel as disgusted by Kuenssberg's biased and dangerous behaviour as I am. Hopefully this will make the BBC realise that Kuenssberg's position is no longer tenable and that they need to rethink how they report politics to their audiences. A Labour government who will initiate Leveson 2 and overhaul the BBC cannot come quickly enough.

#SackLauraKuenssberg

Trump's Brain Fart

"I don't know Michael" Donald Trump said today in reference to Michael Gove.

Um? You met him just two years ago *shakes head* 

What's more baffling is the fact that most TV news haven't picked up on this slip either.

The US President has also said that the NHS is on the table regarding trade negotiations, and then said that it would not be, and he has also claimed that Jeremy Corbyn asked to meet him during the state visit but that he turned him down. Really? Jeremy Corbyn, the man who deliberately boycotted the bun fight that had Trump as guest of honour last night and who led the demonstration against him today wanted to meet him? Well I know he said at the demo he wanted to negotiate a way forward from racism and misogyny but...

Trump also said that the demos were small and, wait for the old classics, 'fake news'

I know politicians lie, but bloody hell, Trump is in a world of his own. Either that, or he's just fucking stupid. Probably both to be fair.

The NHS Is Not For Sale

Trump's state visit will see him sniffing around for a trade deal...and he has his eyes on the NHS.

Yesterday, the US ambassador admitted as much to the BBC. I don't care how you voted in the EU referendum - no one voted for the end of the NHS surely? And yet that's exactly what the hard right Brexit mob, the Farage's and Rees-Mogg's of this world want. And they'll bend over backwards to please Trump.

If our next PM, whoever that may be, gives Trump the trade deal he wants, they'll be signing away the NHS to US companies who will start running the pride of our country for profit.

Please sign this petition to tell Trump hands off the NHS.

The Elephant in the Room of the BBC's NHS 70th Anniversary Season

My jaw dropped at a trailer on TV yesterday for BBC1's Life on the Ward, a two part documentary that sees a group of celebrities spend time in one of London's busiest hospitals and shadowing the staff there.

Quite apart from the pointlessness of shoving celebs in a hospital, my jaw made contact with the floor because of one specific 'celebrity', the elephant in the room of these anniversary commemorations - the former Tory MP and Shadow Health Secretary Ann Widdicombe.

Let's look at Widdicombe's attitude towards the NHS and health shall we by way of her voting record.

She voted against the introduction of foundation hospitals.

She voted against providing assistance to the terminally ill to end their lives.

She voted against the smoking ban.

She voted against all matters EU and migration which shows she has little regard for the NHS's mighty migrant workforce.

She has also said that the NHS was 'founded on all the wrong principles' and that effectively it is doomed to fail and needs replacing.

With all that in mind, it's utterly galling to see such a typically heartless, health privatisation-devotee Tory now attempt to sing the praises of the NHS in her retirement and make a buck or two for doing so as well, simply by watching some nurses perform a job she'd have happily taken from them when she was in government.

In fact the BBC's entire NHS at 70 season seems like an utter joke with well known Tory Nick Robinson hosting one special. It's funny how an allegedly oh so impartial public service broadcaster like the BBC can employ notable right wing figures to discuss a socialist issue as opposed to any notable left wing ones isn't it? The only decent programme that will commemorate the anniversary is on BBC Wales: To Provide All People is a star studded 'film poem' from the makers of 2016's Aberfan: The Green Hollow and 2014's Under Milk Wood.

Edit to add, 22/6/18: The BBC have changed the title Life on the Ward to the more generic Celebrities on the NHS Frontline. The first ep airs on BBC1 on Thursday at 9pm. BBC1 Wales however will not be showing it in that slot, opting instead for To Provide All People. I strongly advise you watch that instead.

The 'Brexit Dividend': The Curious Timing That Means We Should Beware Tories Bearing Gifts

We're hearing a lot from government this week about a so-called 'Brexit dividend' that will go to the NHS. 

What we're not hearing however is that this extra £20bn won't even begin to cover the cuts to the NHS that the Tories have overseen these last 8 years. That an increase of NHS spending to 3.4% is nothing like the 4%+ increase that the think tanks have calculated and have been campaigning for. 

We're also not hearing anything about the timing of Theresa May's pledge. If Brexit falls apart for this government, May will be forced to go to the country once more in the oft-rumoured snap election pencilled in for the autumn. With that in mind, this extra £20bn sounds increasingly like a sop to the electorate in the hope that they'll forget all the Tories failings and vote for them once more. Beware Greeks bearing gifts...or should that be Tories? Timing is everything, clearly.

So don't fall for their bribes and lies! It's all very well saying Brexit will allow us to spend more on the NHS (and we all know we've heard that before, or rather we've seen it before; a lie writ large on the side of a bus!) but if Brexit ensures that we can no longer employ the migrant workforce that keeps the NHS alive, how can the service ever truly improve?

The Facts Behind The Hysteria

With all the mass hysteria going on at the moment, you'd be forgiven for missing this damning letter to the Times; 

Sir, 

Further to your report ('Poison exposure leaves almost 40 needing treatment', Mar 14) may I clarify that no patients have experienced symptoms of nerve agent poisoning in Salisbury and there have only ever been three patients with significant poisoning. Several people have attended the emergency department concerned that they may have been exposed. None has had symptoms of poisoning and none has needed treatment. Any blood tests performed have shown no abnormality. No member of the public has been contaminated by the agent involved.

Stephen Davies,

Consultant in emergency medicine, Salisbury NHS foundation Trust

It's also worth pointing out that the government's line that the nerve agent is 'a type developed by the Russians' doesn't mean made or used by the Russians. And in the midst of the attacks against Corbyn for advising caution (including the 'impartial' BBC's decision to photoshop him as a Russian stooge behind a USSR backdrop last week) how come no one is concerned with the £30,000 donation made to the Tory party by the wife of a former Putin minister - just one of many donations from Russians in recent years. Even Litvenyenko's widow is talking about this, but the media don't seem to want to give her views an airing.

Once again, my advice is look to the truth and not what the government are saying. This is May's Falklands moment and she's loving it, as is the odious Boris Johnson who seems to think he's his beloved Churchill; just in time for The Darkest Hour buzz. Why? Because just like Thatcher's government in '82, it gives them the perfect excuse to bury the real unrest and disasters occurring under May's premiership and the chance to boost her ailing approval ratings with the sheep like contingent of the general public. Brexit, Grenfell etc can all be ignored while they wave what remains of the Union Jack against the menacing Soviet bear.

Definition of Shameless Hypocrisy

With the tragedies of the Grenfell tower block, the MEN bombing and the London attack in recent weeks, the government have been repeatedly (and rightly) praising the work of the emergency services.

But yesterday, they voted to successfully defeat an opposition move to end the public sector pay freeze. Not only that, they cheered themselves for doing it.

If you really valued the people who put their lives on the line to save the lives of others then why can't you put your money where your mouth is and reward them properly?

Money can be found, to the tune of 1.5 billion, to prop up Theresa May's weak premiership with the DUP, but not for these ordinary heroes who are there whenever we need them, but whose response is increasingly hampered by austerity measures.

That is the shameless hypocrisy of this government.

Why I Only Partly Agree With The 'Our Way Of Life Must Continue' Sentiment

Since the horrific attack in Manchester we've heard a lot of sentiment along the lines of how 'our way of life must continue'

It's a sentiment I only partly agree with.

Our way of life - going to work, going shopping, going to live gigs, taking the kids to school, socialising with friends, going to the very city this attack took place - must continue. 

But I hope for one change to our way of life. Because I fervently hope that whatever government gets in next month will realise in the wake of this atrocity that they cannot keep cutting our police and armed forces to the bone, whilst still expecting them to protect us when the unthinkable happens.

Over 20,000 army personnel, along with 8,500 RAF and 5,500 Navy have been cut since 2010. 

We now have fewer police per head of population since 1974.

And don't even start me on the cuts to the NHS and the fact that already beleaguered hospitals have had to step up to the plate and work miracles this week.

And the government needs to realise that it must sever ties with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which have proven to be significant funders of ISIS. The Conservative government still sell billions worth of arms to these countries. The Saudi war on Yemen is something we materially support and yet it is a gift to ISIS - it's like turkeys voting for Christmas.

This way of life must end now. It is the only way to protect our lives.

In the meantime, if you can afford to, please consider donating to this crowdfunder from the Manchester Evening News which aims to raise £2,000,000 to support the families of those killed and injured in Monday night's attack. Currently they're at £1,176,135.

The Truth Behind The NHS Ransomware Attack

If you get your news from the mainstream media, such as the BBC, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the cyber attack that has devastated the NHS is 'just one of those things'.

The Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt - who has seemingly been hiding from the press and public since the attack came to light on Friday - finally popped up today to pretty much repeat the idea that this kind of hack is commonplace and that there are things you can do to prevent it from happening.

Yes there are Jeremy. For a start you can invest in the NHS. You can stop giving the IT systems over to private contractors who care more about profit than they do protection and security.

Did you know that the NHS still operate on an extremely outdated Windows XP system that no longer has effective security measures in place?

Did you know that the Conservative government were offered to purchase a one-year renewal on the XP system in 2014, but that they rejected it as part of their austerity measures?

Did you know that the average annual spend on the NHS's IT systems is just £22,000? 

Just £22,000 a year spent on the IT systems of the NHS. That's effectively the annual wage of just one junior doctor. Think about that.

Did you know that some NHS Trusts have admitted that in some years nothing is spent on IT security and that several years have gone by without any new desktops even being purchased?

Did you know that the day before the cyber attack occurred, the BMJ published an article by Dr Krishna Chinthapalli warning that lax security measures makes them ideal targets for hackers?

Did you know that Edward Snowden has confirmed that Ransomware is a US government security service technology that was originally produced by the NSA?

The malware was made by the US government - why is no one mentioning this on the news?

Jeremy Hunt can promise 'wifi in every hospital' all he likes - but what's really more important here; that a patient can watch the iPlayer whilst waiting for surgery or that NHS staff can do their job without the computer freezing or logging them out every five minutes?

What this story shows, if you delve beyond what the mainstream media is telling you, is that it is the chronic underfunding of the NHS by this Tory government that has led to this attack. Theresa May, in her role as Home Secretary, was responsible for cyber defences and she's clearly sat on her hands and done nothing for seven years.

Please don't give her the opportunity to run the country in the same careless manner.

If you believe the NHS deserves the very best, then please vote Labour on June 8th.

Fighting Back: Save The NHS

The Red Cross have announced that there is a humanitarian crisis in the UK because our NHS is so chronically underfunded and at breaking point.

This is ridiculous.

We are a rich, civilised Western country and we cannot care for our sick and vulnerable.

We cannot because the Tories do not wish too. There's nothing in it for them, so they want to run the NHS into the ground and then wheel out a new privatised health care system, making them money. Something current Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt (the right old cunt) wrote about some years ago as his ultimate aim.

This Tory government have made cuts of £20 billion, with a further £22 billion in their sights. Is it any wonder the single greatest achievement made by this country in the last sixty years is now at crisis point?

We need to act now. We need to demand more funding to save lives and save the NHS for future generations.

Sign this petition now.

Rapid Reviews: Cutting Edge by John Harvey

I'd previously read just one novel by John Harvey and that was 2014's Darkness, Darkness - the final novel in the 13-book series featuring his hero Detective Inspector Charlie Resnick. That novel concerned a cold case mystery left unresolved from the days of the miners strike of 1984/'85. It was OK, a readable affair, but I felt I needed to have experienced Resnick before to have perhaps fully appreciated it. 

So I went back to 1991 and book 3 in the series, Cutting Edge which I recommend. 

A savage assault with a scalpel leaves Dr Tim Fletcher's body badly slashed in a deserted hospital walkway - the first victim in a series of brutal assaults on NHS staff in Nottingham. As panic grips the city, it's up to DI Resnick to find the killer. His chief suspect appears to be an over confident, sexually abusive medical student who had previously dated Fletcher's girlfriend - but is he and his team letting their dislike for the man clouding their judgement? Faced with a mass of clues that lead nowhere, Resnick is confronted by a face from his own past as he finds himself pushed to breaking point.

I really enjoyed this one and have come to like Resnick, the sandwich eating, multiple cat owning and jazz loving troubled 'tec. So much so that I went on to ioffer and bought a DVD of the BBC's sole attempts at adapting Harvey's novels (Lonely Hearts and Rough Treatment, books 1 and 2 in the series) starring Tom Wilkinson in the role and dating back to the early '90s.

Cutting Edge is an engrossing read full of lovely little details that play out on the periphery of the main crime; there's a handful of other investigations Resnick's team are currently looking into, and then there's their home lives too with one of his detective constable's struggling with a wife suffering from post natal depression, and Resnick himself finding himself putting up a drunken down and out acquaintance based on their mutual love for jazz. In tackling these various strands Harvey's style is quite fragmentary at times but it's never alienating or difficult in its approach. Without giving anything away, a turning point of the plot concerns a medical phenomena that is rarely spoken of and quite terrifying to consider!

But if reading Cutting Edge isn't appealing to you, you could always try listening to this enjoyable full-cast adaptation for Radio 4 dating back to 1996 and starring Tom Georgeson as Resnick, a young John Simm as Tim Fletcher and  Gillian Bevan who plays staff nurse Sarah Leonard and also provides the chanteuse torch song style vocals to the play's theme tune.

What Has Become Of Us?

The news that UKIP's leader Diane James is to stand down from her role after just eighteen days ought to be the kind of news that sparks celebration - the thought of UKIP, those dangerous right wing racists, imploding is excellent news.

However, what mars this welcome prospect is the fact that the present Tory government have out UKIPPED the most deranged UKIPPERS.

In conference this week, the Tories have announced the kind of stark hard line on immigration and ethnic minorities usually seen in the most extreme of fascist juntas. Companies are to declare how many foreigners are in their employ, taxi drivers must provide their immigration status, fewer migrants will be allowed to study at our universities and, most damning of all, foreign doctors are to be 'phased out' of the NHS.

Oh, and along with the plans for grammar schools, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon has launched a scheme that will see 150 new units of army cadets in British schools.

Um, I don't know about you - but isn't this screaming the policies of Hitler's Nazi Germany?? But if that's your first reaction, don't worry Fallon's got it covered - he's launched the scheme at a Birmingham school where the majority are Muslim pupils, so you see they believe it is for us to criticise them for the anti-immigration fascists they are when they're surrounding themselves with olive skinned faces. 

And, like Hitler, the reason for this anti-immigration stance is seemingly to protect and preserve our 'strong' economy during these difficult times. It always amazes me that the public opinion seems to be that you cannot trust a Labour government with the economy, when the truth is that the Tories have presided over the slowest economic growth since the 1920s. And crucially, the Tories continue to get it wrong over the economy - if mass immigration is a threat to it, then how come America and Germany prosper? The answer is of course that it is not a threat at all. Like UKIP before them, Theresa May's Tory government have decided to use immigration and ethnic diversity as a scapegoat to blame all the ills of society upon. Ills that they and their ridiculous policies are the real perpetrators of.

The only thing that has changed in the hardline right wing Tory party over the years is that they've got significantly better at masking their disgusting, racist views.

We need to be rid of this government at the first available opportunity. We don't want to live in a country that elects to turn its back on the prosperous reality of immigration. We don't want to live in a country that is short sighted enough to turn its back on the skillset and knowledge base inherent in our NHS simply because they're provided by people of a different skin tone or with a different accent to us.

Please, vote and support Labour. Vote and support anyone in fact. Just don't vote and support a party that wishes to do this to our country.

Behind The Mask (1958)

Notable for being Vanessa Redgrave's cinematic debut, Behind The Mask is a fairly accurate and engrossing, albeit somewhat slow-moving, look at the life of a newly qualified surgeon and the old boys network that exists within the NHS.

Tony Britton stars as our hero, Philip Selwood, a freshly qualified surgical registrar on the firm of the respected but ailing consultant Sir Arthur Benson Gray, played by Michael Redgrave. Selwood is also engaged to his mentor's daughter, Pamela (Vanessa Redgrave) which makes them rather tight, until an issue of malpractice within the hospital rears its head.

Carl Möhner co-stars as Dr Carl Romek, a Polish anaesthetist who is something of an outsider from 'The Pack' (the title of the novel by John Rowan Wilson that this film is based on) whom Selwood takes pity on and becomes rather friendly with. It's clear from the off that Romek is a troubled individual; he has a tragic past thanks to his time in a concentration camp and has a habit of staring off into the distance with a faraway look in his eyes as he talks about himself, so it comes as no surprise when his former girlfriend (Brenda Bruce) reveals to Selwood that Romek is a dope-fiend, hooked on barbiturates since an accident in the camp during the war. He assures Selwood he is clean, but it's a lie and the pair enter theatre to operate on a patient, leading to devastating consequences that threaten to tear Selwood and Pamela apart...

Behind The Mask may be a trifle stiff and dated looking (not helped by the green tinge to the antiquated colour film) but its exploration of medical surgery and the old boys network/'the pack' feels suitably and worryingly authentic. It's certainly more believable and interesting than any current episode of Holby City! Of particular interest is a scene which features an example of early open-heart surgery, though quite why the observation camera prefers to concentrate on the perspiring brow of Redgrave rather than what his hands are actually doing makes a mockery of the realistic edge much of the film is striving for.

It's rather lovely to see Michael and Vanessa Redgrave playing opposite each other, replicating their real life father and daughter relationship. Indeed there's a great cast on display here overall, even though some of them have very little to do (hello, Lionel Jeffries) I especially liked Ian Bannen as a whitecoat forever cadging cigarettes off his colleagues. Oh and eagle eyed viewers will spot a certain William Roache aka Ken Barlow pacing around, pulling on cigarettes in a couple of early scenes as a young doctor. I may be wrong but I think this might be his only other credit aside from Coronation Street which he has been in since the very first episode in 1960. 

Kudos too for realistically conveying the ethnic diversity inherent within the British medical world and how the NHS welcomed immigrants from the commonwealth and the like because of their talents and dedication; something which has stupidly come under threat thanks to the Brexit vote.

Save Liverpool Women's Hospital, Save the NHS

I hope all the people who voted for Brexit with the absurd idea that the NHS would be revitalised if we leave the EU feel thoroughly conned and ashamed today as the government reveal some of the most harshest and damaging cuts to our already beleaguered health service.

There are several petitions regarding the threat facing the NHS in your area on 38 degrees that I urge you to check out and sign.

Which leads me to one particular hospital in my area that is facing closure - the prestigious Liverpool Women's Hospital, star of Channel 4's One Born Every Minute.

The Women's is an award winning maternity institute that cares for extremely poorly babies at the start of their lives, their mothers and is also at the forefront of fertility research.

I don't know if it is the done thing to publicise such things, but it is via that last specialty which it provides that I have come to know the Women's as the caring, pioneering and first class hospital it is. It is this personal experience that means I am urging you to do your bit in protecting its future.

Please sign the petition and share it.

There will be a march through Liverpool commencing from the hospital at 12pm on Sunday, September 25th. For more info see the campaign's Facebook page. I'll be there.

Don't Let Brexit Ruin The NHS

EU migrants keep our NHS going. 1 in 10 doctors are EU citizens. Weeks have passed since that monumental vote was cast to leave the EU but the government have still not made a decision on whether EU medics can stay in the UK or not. The longer this decision goes unmade, the more likely it is we'll see 55,000 staff members within the NHS pack their bags and take their considerable expertise elsewhere - a place where they feel welcome.  

Theresa May needs to realise that without these people, people who make significant contributions to our NHS and society as a whole, we would be much worse off. Please sign this petition  and let her and her government know that we simply cannot afford to lose them.

The NHS was shamelessly used as a political tool in the Leave campaign. We were told lie after lie regarding it. It's time we get some honest answers. Answers we want to hear.