Evil Tory Tosser Libels Angels of Mercy

[Morris Onions]

A Conservative peer has launched an outspoken attack on nurses who treated him in hospital, calling them "grubby, drunken and promiscuous".

Lord Mancroft, who works with a number of health charities, said nurses at the Royal United Hospital in Bath were "an accurate reflection of many young women in Britain today".

His comments sparked anger among staff at the hospital and nursing unions, but last night he told The Daily Telegraph he stood by what he said.

Lord Mancroft, 50, was taken ill last August and admitted to the hospital for the removal of an abscess.

He said: "The nurses who looked after me were mostly grubby - we are talking about dirty fingernails and hair - and were slipshod and lazy. Worst of all, they were drunken and promiscuous.

"How do I know that? You see, if you are a patient and lying in a bed and being nursed from either side, they talk across you as if you're not there. So I know exactly what they got up to the night before, how much they drank and what they were planning to do the next night. I can tell you it's pretty horrifying."

He added: "I can only tell you that it is a miracle that I am still alive. The wards were filthy. Underneath the bed where I was, there lay a piece of dirty cotton wool and it remained there for several days. The ward was never cleaned."

Lord Mancroft, who lives in Badminton, Gloucs, made his comments during a House of Lords debate on Thursday. He claimed he had to be "kidnapped" from his hospital bed by his wife, Emma, and transferred to a hospital in London. Yesterday, he said: "The words I used in my speech I thought about very carefully. These are not off-the-cuff. It is none of my business what a nurse drinks or what her love life is about. I don't want to hear it."

He said he did not want apologies or compensation, but improved health care. "I would like the people of Bath to have the health care they deserve. In my view, they are not getting it."

....

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/29/nnurses129.xml


Sounds like some of em are getting it, and good luck to em too!

Is it far to Bath?

[Zyg]

1. Bath's just east of Bristol on the M4

Sounds like it could be an educational night out!

And, in my limited experience of nurses, I'd have to concur with the honourable Lord's conclusions - having once spent one night in a house inhabited by 5 nurses (and having seen the state that one of them lives in currently), I'm not at all amazed that so many people die of Hospital Acquired Infections.

There was Black Mould growing all the way around the bath. I'm not kidding - all around the rim. The only thing that had halted its growth was the glass shower screen - although I'm willing to bet that a mutant strain was considering ways of getting past this minor inconvenience on its way to world domination. And I won't even begin to describe the state of the bedrooms.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

2. The Nasty Party

lost none of its nastiness it seems.

Well gosh, nurses have sex lives, and drink on their nights out. It's none of Mancroft's business, yet he listened in to nurses' conversations and blathered to the world.

If neoliberal capitalists weren't so concerned with bringing market forces into public services, then cleaning may have been done properly instead of bringing in the private sector on the cheap to do a half-arsed job.

I note he didn't even thank anyone for care in the removal of his abscess. What a fuckwit.

[LeftishBrit]

3. Good points...

And nursing (like lots of things) might be in a better state if it were still run by experienced professionals (in this case, Matrons) rather than managers who want to run everything like a factory. A system originally introduced by the Tories.

Being right-wing seems to be so associated with blaming everything on Other People's Sex Lives. Raises some interesting questions as to why!!

[non sociopath skin]

4. I could not do a nurse's job.

The difficult environment,the long and often unsociable hours, the constant pressure from ill and stressed-out patients and their families, arrogant consultants and outcome-orientated bureaucrats, the unrelenting contact and need for constant vigilance with those suffering from serious illnesses and injuries ... and all for considerably less than a queen's ransom.

Yes, many of the nurses I know drink and smoke a lot. In their place, I probably would, too.

But I guess that's lost on a wanker who's probably never done what anyone here would recognise as a real job in his life.

The Skin

[LeftishBrit]

5. Nor could I

And probably nor could he!

[moggie]

6. Are we sure they discharged the right bit?

I think they should have disposed of the "lord" and sent the abscess home: it would have been less malignant.