Being pensioners, my wife & I are seeing more of the NHS than in earlier days. Our experience of their staff has always been favourable. From first contact with a GP surgery to interviews with specialists, staff response has been exemplary.

In November this year, my wife had to spend 4 days in hospital. We saw first-hand much of what was reported in the media. An ambulance was needed so that the right equipment and training was available.

At the hospital, my wife spent the first night on a chair in a waiting room while other patients were in the corridor. The hours passed as did the drunks, addicts, police and an inadequately dressed hen party.. On the second day a bed became available. On the 4th day we were delayed from going home because the pharmacy had run out of the medication needed.

Throughout this experience, the staff remained calm, competent and kind. The problems were not of their making.

The origin of the problems is that there are 130,000 vacancies in the NHS and that the nurses’ pay & conditions are among the poorest in Europe. These problems have been many years in the making, so I am not sympathetic to the hypocrites on TV who lament the pain, distress and worry caused by some of the nurses going on strike for 12 hours.

The suffering of patients was not caused by 12 hours of strikes, but has built to breaking point by over 12 years of worsening delays, cancellations and worry. The suffering was there before the Ukraine war and before Covid. If we took away the strikes and unions the suffering of patients would still be there.

Conditions could deteriorate further if the only alternative is for staff to resign. They could transfer to private health, agency work, or emigrate. I saw this when visiting a hospital in Brisbane, where there was a remarkable number of staff with English accents, who had departed England after training.

The obvious way to attract staff to fill our vacancies is to improve pay and conditions before 130,000 become 200,000.

Our government justifies its stance as “we cannot afford pay increases as we must reduce the debt ASAP”. We have dealt with debts before when we were poorer, notably after World War II, and it was spread over many years to reduce its impact.

We are also informed that the government cannot make an exception. Rubbish! We can and should make an exception because our NHS is exceptional.

J.Graham

King's Stanley