Had some pretty good news earlier. As I was saying yesterday that I went to see Merlin and he was going to contact the Dermatologist to try and get them to see me ASAP, well, he’s managed to do it yet again he’s got me an appointment this Friday. I don’t know how he does it but he’s good.

I don’t know if you’ve seen the press and the news today but a subject close to my heart has reared its ugly head again and that’s Hospital Parking Charges. Unless you’re blind you will all know my feelings on this subject. I was pretty mad at the BBC though as they have sort of lead the way by using the Freedom Of Information Act to obtain figures of parking income from English Hospital but didn’t think to include Welsh Hospitals in their questioning. It got me thinking which as you know can prove to be very dangerous to anyone within a reasonable distance to me, this Freedom Of Information Thing could be quite fun. Sort of a chance to legally pester the various government departments for useless information. The beeb were making such a thing of one particular NHS Trust in Birmingham which made over a million in charges which I’m sure Cardiff and the Vale won’t be far off that. When you think about some Leukaemia patients including myself for a long time are having to come in at least 5 days a week and at a minimum of £2.10 a time and more like double that because of the length of stay it soon mounts up. I know that the trusts first response would be to say that they do in fact supply a weekly reduced parking voucher for such patients, BUT there are certain criteria you must follow, they are, you must park in the Multi Story Car Park which is the furthest Car Park from the Hospital and the Porters will not come out that far if you need wheelchair assistance and what if you are attending other clinics in the outlying buildings how are you supposed to get to them?? The walk from the Multi Story to the Concourse will take around 15 minutes or in my case probably around 2 days that’s if I make it at all in my state, then you have to get to whatever department it is you need which could be another 15 minute walk, so is this really practical???? I THINK NOT!! Another madly annoying thing is that Judith’s sister who is an accountant was involved in the initial study into car parking charges when they were planning to send out tenders to private companies to run it and she was saying that even at 20p an hour they would stand to make a profit so the charges now are a real insult. Thankfully the other hospital that I attend at Llandough is currently not charging for Disabled Badge Holders although the parking Contractor from the heath has just taken over control of them so I recon it is only a matter of time before that changes.

So if anyone has any good ideas as to what I should pester the poor under worked government departments about feel free to let me know in the comments if you like. I got a few to get on with at least.

See Ya!!