I’m passionate that our local public services, such as the health service, should be as much part of their local community as possible – and indeed accountable to them.
So when the Whittington hospital started asking people to sign up as ‘members’ of it, as part of its bid to become an NHS Foundation Trust, I signed up. And when they invited local people to put themselves forward potentially to be on their ‘Council of Governors’, I submitted a nomination for that too. With about 3,500 members of the trust (excluding staff), and a huge area, containing the whole of Islington, Camden and Hackney, as well as parts of the City and Westminster, electing just six people to the Council, it was fairly obviously going to be a quite hotly contested election. But I was keen to be involved and play my part in ensuring that the hospital’s management are responsive to local people, and so I resolved to give it a try. And if you were one of the, er, one or two local residents that I asked to sign up as members too, thanks very much for doing so.