The Milton Keynes HAGS

117,810 words written to date – On schedule to finish and publish I LOVE OUR NHS – David’s Story in time for Beck’s fifth anniversary.

Today I want to share a chapter which is somewhat local.

 

Within Milton Keynes there are more legends and heritage than can be found in any other town, city or village in the country. FACT.

 Within these legends and heritage there is nothing that can match that of University Hospital Milton Keynes.

Milton Keynes has more heritage and more legend per square mile than any other town city or village anywhere in the country. Who in Milton Keynes can remember The MK Hags ?  Have they now become a legend ?  A forgotten legend perhaps ? But just look at the heritage The Milton Keynes Hags have given us.

For the planners within Milton Keynes Development Corporation life must have been something like playing three dimensional chess. Areas of employment had to be created but there was no point in doing this without having housing to accommodate the workers. What was the point of having houses with workers living there if there were no jobs ?  Ashlands in South Milton Keynes was originally a caravan site for workers and Scot of Bletchley Makers of the World’s Finest Cooked Meats used to ‘bus workers in from London every day.

Add to all of this the need to bring in services such as shops, community centres, schools and so on at the right time and in the right place it must have been a nightmare of a job to be a new city planner.

MILTON KEYNES IS DYING FOR A HOSPITAL. That was the motto, slogan, call it what you like of the MK Hags – Milton Keynes Hospital Action Group. Within the designate plan an area of land was set aside on what was to become the Eaglestone Estate where at the right time a hospital was to be constructed. But when was the right time ? The population needed to be large enough to both staff a hospital and to provide the patients. Milton Keynes Hospital Action Group vigorously campaigned to advance the date of the hospital’s opening. Milton Keynes was indeed dying for a hospital. Literally.

Without a hospital the new city was primarily served by Stoke Manderville Hospital in Aylesbury with some patients also being taken to Northampton. The roads we know today between these locations are not the way they were in pre-hospital Milton Keynes. A skilled ambulance driver with blue lights and sirens could perhaps make it to Aylesbury in twenty to twenty-five minutes.

Milton Keynes was dying for  hospital.

It was in the mid 1970’s when I was in the White Hart pub on Whaddon Way, Bletchley, when a young man collapsed to the floor. Everyone thought he was drunk. I can clearly remember someone on each side of him holding him up and trying to walk him about to sober him. A 999 call was made. The duty doctor for the area was on another case so it was a while before he attended. An ambulance came to the pub. The man, I guess he would have been in his late thirties, was not drunk but had suffered a heart attack. He died. Milton Keynes was dying for a hospital.

Milton Keynes did not have a hospital but in Whalley Drive Bletchley there was a maternity unity, Bletchley Maternity Hospital staffed by midwives with GP doctors popping in and out.

14^th September 1980 my wife was a patient with my son reluctant to make his entry to the world. Another lady was in a similar situation. As her husband and I waited we chatted and shared experiences. It was decided in my family’s case to wait and see how things developed but in the other case the flying squad was called in. This was a team of experts who blue lighted their way to Bletchley from Aylesbury, not from Stoke Manderville Hospital but from The Royal Buckinghamshire Hospital which was a specialist maternity unit. Finding the lady was expecting twins and not a single baby she was raced to Aylesbury by ambulance.

It was not the flying squad who decided my wife needed to be moved by ambulance to The Royal Bucks but our family GP, Doctor Labrum.

In Aylesbury I met up again with the gentleman I had spent time with at Bletchley Maternity Hospital. His wife had given birth to a son but his twin brother was still born.

“How am I going to bring my son up,” The gentleman said, “knowing his brother has died ?”

If Milton Keynes had a hospital that child would not have died.  Milton Keynes is dying for a hospital. It was, it most definitely was.

The sophisticated grid road system we know today in the third decades of the twenty-first century was but a series of lines on a plan in those years when Milton Keynes was dying for a hospital. Marlborough Street was an early line to come off the plan and become a length of tarmac. To the south were the estates of Tinkers Bridge, Netherfield, Bean Hill and Coffee Hall. At the northern end was Eaglestone after which Marlborough Street passed through open fields until it met the estates at the other end of the new city’s development plan.

In the Eaglestone field where the hospital would one day be built stood a giant sculptured question mark. I managed to find an image of that sculpture and used it for the cover of my book MILTON DREAMS THE CITY THAT NEVER WAS. I challenge you to make a Google search for that sculpture, you will not succeed. Way back everyone knew it, everyone driving along Marlborough Street saw it but today it is forgotten. A legend it may perhaps be but a legend fast fading. I wonder what ever happened to the question mark, I sadly think it was thrown away. When our hospital came into being, when Milton Keynes Hospital Action Group achieved its aim so there was no need for the statue. Sad it was lost but wonderful it was no longer needed.

Milton Keynes is dying for a hospital ? NOT ANY LONGER ! The MK Hags became a legend as Milton Keynes General Hospital was born.

Entering the hospital from Standing Way today on your left you will find the post graduate centre and a giant multi-storey car park. In the early days this area comprised a ground level paved area for free car parking and a field. Every Sunday this hosted one of the biggest car boot sales in the country. I doubt there is a car boot sale anywhere today to match it in size and number of punters. It was said that the organisers paid the hospital one thousand pounds a week to hire the area. With inflation that would be £3,795 in today’s money. Not bad eh ! With the expansion of the hospital the boot sale has too passed into legend.

Milton Keynes is dying for a hospital became Milton Keynes General Hospital which became University Hospital Milton Keynes. Today our hospital has become a legend it its own time, it may operate under the official name of University Hospital Milton Keynes but in truth it is Beautiful, Incredible, Utterly Amazing, Loving University Hospital Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes Hags what do you think about that ?

I ran twice for election to the hospital board of governors, the second time I lost by six votes. I was very upset, it took me several weeks to get over the pain of not being able to serve our hospital in this way.

University Hospital Milton Keynes is without question one of the finest in the land but it does have a deep-rooted problem. I does not reach out and draw in love from the community. Love to support its work, love to celebrate its staff members and love to help care for its patients.

I discussed this matter with the then chairman of the hospital’s board who agreed with me. I felt it was the job of the governors to undertake this task but it simply was not something members were considering. I, therefore, came up with some ideas of my own and began putting them into actions.

TEEN HERO MK:

This is a project I set up in 2019 and had ready to begin operation in February 2020 but was scuppered by the pandemic. The way things have progressed across the following two years I find myself far from being optimistic that it ever could be revived.

University Hospital Milton Keynes Milton Keynes uses six thousand pints of blood in a year to treat its patients. Once a person reaches their seventeenth birthday they can sign on as a blood donor and give a pint of blood three times a year. TeenHeroMK intended to find two thousand 17+ teenagers to become donors and repay our hospital’s debt to the blood donor system.

Engaging with schools is not the easiest of tasks as such are target driven and do not always have time to focus on projects outside the curriculum and examination system. This is not a criticism but a fact of life. However, I did manage to build a relationship with the headmaster of Oakgrove School, a school with a sound and celebrated reputation within Milton Keynes. This was going to be the project’s lead school from which the project would be rolled out across MK.

Teenagers were inspired and donation times booked. However, the pandemic then thrust all schools into measures which made it impossible to go forward. Everything was put on the back burner and now the project has been cancelled. Although the corona virus situation is very different two years on schools are probably in a harder position now than when the original project was cancelled. There are staff shortages and teenagers are being attacked by the virus.

Cops4Blood

When I was trying to make this project happen in 2019/2020 I mentioned it to a senior community police officer who offered to put himself forward as a donor. From this I suggested Cops4Blood as a way to not only support the cohort of teenagers but also to celebrate the work our police officers do. However, pandemic again and all came to nothing. Add to this a change in officer staffing the idea is a bit dead in the water.

PROJECT WOMBLE

This is something I put together in discussions with Simon Lloyd when he was Chairman of University Hospital Milton Keynes. However, in part due to the tardy and somewhat inefficient operation of the local probation service managing community payback teams and then with the onset of the pandemic in early 2020 it never happened.

University Hospital Milton Keynes is supposedly a non-smoking campus and yet the number of cigarette buts to be found littering the ground is a major problem. So it was when I first put forward this suggestion.

My idea which I put to Simon Lloyd and obtained his agreement was to have a community payback team from the probation service initially clear the site and then to maintain the campus in a more tidy condition. 100% absence of cigarette buts is a major ambition but even one picked up and properly disposed of would be of value. If there is an absence of cigarette buts on the ground then surely smokers are less likely to dispose of their fag ends in this way.

I made an application to the Justice Department and was accepted to have a community payback team undertake the project. However, nobody from the department moved to engage with me in order to make things happen. I repeatedly wrote to the probation service in Milton Keynes without reply. It must have looked to the management of our hospital that I was at fault, failing to deliver on the initiative I put forward.

Finally  I managed to talk with a privatised area of the probation service: Thames Valley Community Rehabilitation Company  This was far from an easy activity within which to engage. Eventually we reached the point where a site inspection was to take place but the pandemic closed all possibilities of such happening.

I have considered trying to revive the projects but do not see the semi-post pandemic society getting behind the ideas.

I LOVE OUR NHS and I LOVE OUR HOSPITAL. I want to do something to take that love out of my heart and wrap it around every staff member and every patient in the hospital. But how ? Perhaps this book in its own way may help.

I am thinking back to my taking my late Father-in-law to hospital. We were waiting in the A & E Department when he said quite loudly: I don’t suppose they give you anything to eat in here do they !

His words were heard by a volunteer who immediately went and fetched him a cheese sandwich !

Volunteers. Unpaid carers of love daily supporting the front-line medical staff. I wonder how many University Hospital Milton Keynes has ? I don’t know and I am not going to try to find out, you simply can not quantify love.

Once upon a time people used to say that nurses were angels. I disagree with that, nurses are not angels they are saints. Within the heaven of saints in University Hospital Milton Keynes, within every hospital in our NHS, can be found the saintly love of volunteers.

Within Milton Keynes there are more legends and heritage than can be found in any other town, city or village in the country. FACT. 

Within these legends and heritage there is nothing that can match that of University Hospital Milton Keynes.

West Bletchley Council - Record of attendance

As I prepared to take what action I could in regard to West Bletchley Council disrespecting our local police and putting residents at risk I took a look at the council's website in order to check out individual councillors' support. I WAS HORRIFIED ! Please read and I hope you will be as angered as I am. You, I, we deserve better.

WEST BLETCHLEY COUNCIL MEMBERS – CURRENT YEAR ATTENDANCE RATES as recorded on the council’s website.

Geraldine Halder – Abbey’s Ward - 77%

Kit Power – Abbey’s Ward - 20% !

Zarak Dorsett-Morgan Abbeys Ward 100%

Christian Drugo Abbeys Ward 100%

Matthew Burn – Castles Ward-  63%

Sue Long – Castles Ward - 62%

Gladstone McKenzie – Castles Ward 63%

Wagas Ahmed – Church Green Ward – 67%

Jim Kearon – Church Green Ward – 90%

Nabeel Nazir – Church Green Ward – 60%

Paul Harvey – Counties Ward – 85%

Nigel Long – Counties Ward – 86%

Sheri Defalni – Fairways Ward – 42% !

Derek Hircock – Fairways Ward – 83%

Ian Layded – Fairways Ward – 78%

Michael Donald – Poets Ward – 92%

Paul Moore – Poets Ward – 75%

James Butson – Racecourses Ward – 67%

Elaine Wales – Racecourses Ward – 81%

Veronica Belcher – Rivers Ward – 88% *

Ray Brady – Rivers Ward – 76%

Naomi Sinclair – Rivers Ward – 42% !

Andy Coaton – Saints Ward – 50% !

Ernie Thomas – Saints Ward – 89% *

Ken Rowe – Scots Ward – 33% !

Felicity Cockbain – Scots Ward – 79%

Barbra Moore – Scots Ward – 79%

Veronica Belcher and Ernie Thomas have their attendance calculated against ONLY full council meetings and not, as they are chair and vice-chair of the council, including any committee meetings. Even so both have failed to put in 100% attendance.

During the time I served on West Bletchley Council I was the ONLY member to put in 100% attendance. As you can see from the above just two councillors within the present membership match my record.

If you are prepared to accept a lower figure of 90% as being an acceptable attendance level only two councillors have achieved such. FIVE achieve 50% or less attendance with one putting in only 20%.

I reside in Rivers Ward where during the past twelve months not a single member of the council representing the ward has made any contact at all with residents.

From the above figures an average attendance rate across all councillors is 71.37%. If a child in school put in a similar attendance his/her parents would likely be called to account for such with a possibility of action being taken against them. Is there an employee anywhere in the country who would accept such a poor level of attendance from a staff member ?

On a PERSONAL level I would celebrate the attendance Zarak Dorsett-Morgan and

Christian Drugo. However, I would call for all members listed above in red to seriously consider their position and give an undertaking to immediately increase their commitment or to resign their membership. For those listed in RED BOLD: Kit Power, Sheri Defalni, Naomi Sinclair, Andy Coaton and Ken Rowe to IMMEDIATELY RESIGN from West Bletchley Council in order to make way for people who will offer a stronger commitment to our community.

Moving on now to the various committees operating within West Bletchley Council.

ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITTEE:

Chair Paul Harvey – Counties Ward – 85%

Vice Chair Elaine Wales – Racecourses Ward – 81%

Members:

Wagas Ahmed – Church Green Ward – 67%

James Butson – Racecourses Ward – 67%

Sheri Defalni – Fairways Ward – 42% !

Michael Donald – Poets Ward – 92%

Zarak Dorsett-Morgan 100%

Geraldine Halder – Abbey’s Ward - 77%

Derek Hircock – Fairways Ward – 83%

Jim Kearon – Church Green Ward – 90%

Ian Layded – Fairways Ward – 78%

Gladstone McKenzie – Castles Ward 63%

Paul Moore – Poets Ward – 75%

Ken Rowe – Scots Ward – 33% !

14 members Average overall attendance 73.78%

FINANCE COMMITTEE

Chair Barbra Moore – Scots Ward – 79%

Vice Chair Nigel Long – Counties Ward – 86%

Members

Ray Brady – Rivers Ward – 76%

Felicity Cockbain – Scots Ward – 79%

Sheri Defalni – Fairways Ward – 42% !

Zarak Dorsett-Morgan 100%

Christian Drugo Abbeys Ward 100%

Jim Kearon – Church Green Ward – 90%

Gladstone McKenzie – Castles Ward 63%

Paul Moore – Poets Ward – 75%

Nabeel Nazir – Church Green Ward – 60%

11 members Average overall attendance 77.27%

COMMUNITY COMMITTEE

Chair Felicity Cockbain – Scots Ward – 79%

Vice Chair Sheri Defalni – Fairways Ward – 42% ! How is it possible to have a vice chair who has such a poor overall attendance record ?

Members

Wagas Ahmed – Church Green Ward – 67%

Ray Brady – Rivers Ward – 76%

Zarak Dorsett-Morgan 100%

Christian Drugo Abbeys Ward 100%

Ian Layded – Fairways Ward – 78%

Sue Long – Castles Ward - 62%

Paul Moore – Poets Ward – 75%

Ken Rowe – Scots Ward – 33% !

Naomi Sinclair – Rivers Ward – 42% !

11 members Average overall attendance 68.54%

SALDEN CHASE SUB-COMMITTEE (NOTE there are issues opening details for this committee within the council’s website. The URL lists it as parking sub-committee)

Chair Ernie Thomas – Saints Ward – 89%

Vice Chair Andy Coaton – Saints Ward – 50% ! How is it possible to have a vice chair who has such a poor overall attendance record ?

Members

Michael Donald – Poets Ward – 92%

Nigel Long – Counties Ward – 86%

Nabeel Nazir – Church Green Ward – 60%

Elaine Wales – Racecourses Ward – 81%

6 members Average overall attendance 76.33%

NOTES:

Not a single committee chair or vice-chair has an acceptable overall attendance record.

Community Committee vice chair Sheri Defalni has an overall attendance record of 42%

Salden Chase Sub-committee vice chair Andy Coaton has an overall attendance record of 50%

The following members of West Bletchley Council do not serve on any committees:

Kit Power – Abbey’s Ward - 20%

Matthew Burn – Castles Ward-  63%

I would invite residents of West Bletchley to consider the above statistics and form their own unbiased opinions as to the relevance of West Bletchley Council within our community and the level of support given by individual councillors.

When this has been done I would ask residents to place their conclusions alongside West Bletchley Council’s failure to support our local police and in so doing have put the safety of the West Bletchley Community at risk.

D J B Ashford

A West Bletchley Resident since 1971

Haircuts For Heroes

 I am coming close to publishing my book I LOVE OUR NHS – David’s Story. 117,938 words so far with perhaps another five or ten thousand to go.

A couple of months ago I shared an idea for a sponsored haircut but was not able to build a team around me to make it  happen. Now, from the book I want to rebrand this as HAIRCUTS FOR HEROES. What do you  think ?

Time for action now words.

That’s a bit of a strange title, is it not, for the concluding chapter of this book !  How many words have I used to tell my story and my personal love for our NHS ?

Haircut for heroes, what the heck is that all about ?

OK let me explain.

On the first anniversary and the second anniversary of Beck’s passing I subjected myself to sponsored haircuts supporting good causes. Pandemic and lock down meant nothing similar happened in 2020 and 2021. What about 2022 ?

I came up with an idea for a sponsored haircut to take place in August raising support for the Childrens’ Department within University Hospital Milton Keynes. However, I simply could not gather support around me to make it happen, if I went ahead it would have been an failure.

Since abandoning the idea I have felt terribly sad. That sadness refuses to go away.

Can I start again ? Can WE start again ?

This book will be published by Amazon on Thursday 19^th May 2022 – The fifth anniversary of Rebekah’s passing.

I propose launching HAIRCUTS FOR HEROES on Tuesday 5^th July 2022 – This is our NHS’s birthday.

The haircut will then happen on Sunday 27^th November – Advent Sunday.

My aim is to raise £1,000 for the work of the Childrens’ Department within University Hospital Milton Keynes.

As I have so many times said within this book, I have been a patient of Whaddon Healthcare since September 1971. I want this haircut to happen as such a patient and make it a project within Whaddon Healthcare to support and love families with a child sick in University Hospital Milton Keynes.

I will set up a JustGiving page on Tuesday 5^th July and donate royalties from the sale of this book. I will personally promise to fill that JustGiving page with £1,000. Any shortfall of donations I will fund myself.

For the two haircuts held in 2018 and 2019 the first snip was made by The Mayor of Milton Keynes. I will extend an invitation to the current Mayor to follow in his forbearers’ footsteps. I have between now and then to grow my hair. 19^th May to 27^th November, SIX months so shouldn’t be a problem.

I will sort out a location and other logistics. THIS WILL HAPPEN.

But can we make it a bit bigger ?  Can we make it a lot bigger ?

Whaddon Healthcare covers West Bletchley with its surgery at 25 Witham Court and East Bletchley at Fern Grove, how many patients does it CARE for across the area ? Would any of those patients agree to grow their hair and join in Haircuts For Heroes ?

If I could find another four so having the scissors orbit a total of five heads how much money could find its way into the JustGiving page ? Could we set a target of £2,000 ?

How about ten hairy heads ? £4,000.

Twenty ? £8,000

Fifty ? £20,000

One hundred ? £40,000

Beyond ten it may become a bit of a logistic nightmare but what a nightmare to have.

Actions speak louder than words. Within the one hundred thousand and more words in this book I am within this last chapter injecting action to the tune of £1,000, will you join me 

One final thought. Every single penny finding its way to University Hospital Milton Keynes and the heroes working there in its children’s department MUST be wrapped in LOVE.

TIME FOR ACTION NOT WORDS

The Sun Never Sets On Ronald McDonald

 Let me share another chapter in my forthcoming book I LOVE OUR NHS - David's Story

I am not actually talking about a double cheeseburger with large fries.  Is such medicinal ?  If you want a little bit of a giggle, if you want to SMILE go to YouTube and type in Jake goes to McDonald’s where you can see my best friend Doggie Jake who I will speak about in a later chapter checking out a double cheeseburger.

Let me start by sharing something I wrote in the early 1990’s and published in my book Not The Concrete Cows. As you read the next one thousand and fifty-three words ponder just how much things have changed over the past thirty years.

OK………….. Welcome to McDonald’s how can I help you today ?

How Fast Is Fast Food:

Within the current Thompson Directory for Milton Keynes there are listed no less than twenty-eight fish and chip shops, thirteen Chinese takeaways, three branches of McDonald's, one each of Burger King and Kentucky's Fried Chicken, three Indian take aways, six pizza shops and ten other assorted outlets offering a variety of food to be eaten off the premises. A staggering sixty-five establishments.

I suppose when anyone mentions fast food the mind instantly turns to McDonald's. There are at present three branches of the burger giant in Milton Keynes including the restaurant thought to be the busiest in the country. Anyone who has tried to get a Big Mac in Central Milton Keynes on a busy Saturday lunchtime could not fail to appreciate this fact and may perhaps, be excused for questioning just how fast is fast food ? The McDonald's Corporation now runs 13,093 outlets in 63 different countries of the world. There are 522 outlets in the United Kingdom alone employing some 33,373 staff.

As well as actually introducing the term fast food to the English language Ronald McDonald (In real life he was Ray Krock who began the business with Dick and Mac McDonald in San Bernardino California in 1954) has added Big Mac and Big Mac Attack to our dictionaries. The marketing department has taught us to say fries instead of chips, to say to go instead of takeaway and bun in place of bread roll, with or without sesame seeds !

In a recent survey of 500 households 32% had eaten food from McDonald's in the last week while a staggering 73% tackled burgers and fries within the past month. Only 6% claimed never to have eaten beneath the Golden Arches of McDonald's.

The original business is actually called McDonald's Golden Arches Restaurants but revised to McDonald's Restaurants Limited in 1983. The regional training centre in Sutton Coldfield is still known as Golden Arches House.

Worldwide two hundred and fifty million customers are served every day and the last audited yearly account showed that they spent $21,885,000,000 ! The Corporation shares are listed on the New York, Frankfurt, Munich Paris and Tokyo stock exchanges but not in London. In 1995, twenty years after the corporation’s shares had first been placed on public sale, an initial investment of $2,250 add increased over $250,000 !

The pizza may have originated in Europe but it took the American touch to turn it into fast food. One particular establishment in San Francisco would deliver your order to your home in a Rolls Royce motor car. So Domino's of Netherfield how about it ?  The first drive through (sorry THRU) descended on Milton Kings courtesy of Colonel Sanders and Kentucky Fried Chicken on Stacey Bushes. Not to be outdone McDonald's followed with two of their own. They have a total of 106 throughout the country. One of my ambitions is to fill a double decker bus with passengers then pull up at the latest restaurant on Rookley and watch their panic

Have you ever wondered how the guy behind the counter in the Chinese takeaway takes your order in English scribbled it down in hieroglyphics, bawls through the little hatch to the kitchen staffing in Cantonese and then when the brown paper bag pops back knows which order belongs to who no matter how many customers may be waiting in the shop ? Clever isn't it ? But was the ever popular chinky introduced to us direct from Asia or via Chinatown in a dozen major American cities ?

You may smile at the current TV advert which claims the word burger originates from Germany but it's true ! Fries from the Latin frigo but both needed to make the trip to the USA before entering into common use. Let me make a prophecy, One of the most popular US fast food outlets is Taco Bell selling Mexican dishes at budget prices. Within the next decade Taco Bell will open in Central Milton Keynes. We are already on the way there with The Point offering nachos and hot cheese to go with the big picture so developing the Milton Keynes taste for Mexican spice.

But what of the good old fish and chip shop ? Twenty-eight of them in the city and still the most popular vendor of all takeaway food. The survey showed even higher figures for family eating their food than McDonald's with an amazing 50% having eaten there during the past week. Only one family admitted to never having eaten takeaway fish and shop chips and its members are strict vegan-vegetarians.

One of the more famous chip shops in Milton Keynes is Pat O’Leary’s in West Bletchley. It was regional finalist in the 1992 Fish And Chip Shop Of The Year. After a refit to his premises Mr O'Leary intends entering the contest again in 1994 with hopes of making it through to the national finals. If the attitude of his customers is anything to go by he can have every reason to be competent.

Talking to Mr O'Leary I became aware his belief that the local chip shop is an important part of the community and not just another retail outlet. He sponsors Abbeys School’s football team and had received the mayors award for service to the community.

As well as seeing the invasion of American fast food as competition Mr O'Leary believes it has done much to improve the quality of the traditional fish and chip shop. Gone all the days of the steamy fries and grease laden chips which were wrapped in old newspapers. Wherever did the proprietor get all his papers from ? He must have been an avid newspaper reader ! The modern shop is an epitome of hygiene and excellence.

It has been said that what America does today we will copy in ten years time. This is certainly true for the explosion of American fast food throughout Great Britain. But why is that we cannot benefit by exporting our ideas the other way across the Atlantic ? On a visit to California, the birthplace of McDonald's, a friend insisted on taking me for lunch to a traditional English fish and chip shop. We drove to the other side of the city only to find it closed !

Back to the future, back to 2022. How many branches of McDonald’s are there in  the UK today ? One thousand, three hundred and fifty-four but that number will probably have increased by the time I finish writing this chapter. How many in the world ?  Too many to accurately count so we’ll settle for a figure in excess of thirty-six thousand. As for the number of countries serving burgers and fries there are more than one hundred.

In the 1960’s if school dinners served burgers that was a bigger punishment than being sent to the headmaster’s study !

1^st October 1974 has gone down in British History as the opening of the first McDonald’s in England. I have been there, to Woolwich in London and found a plaque commemorating its legend. I think she was four, perhaps five when my daughter Rebekah had her birthday party at McDonald’s in Central Milton Keynes. One of my former students worked at the branch and organised the party, what a super event he gave Beck.

Beck was a great fan of McDonald’s. Her medical condition made eating something uncomfortable and a process to be avoided if at all possible. She spent most of her childhood in and out of hospital, Guys Hospital in London where the catering was the world’s most effective dietary plan. Nobody ate anything ! So when McDonald’s opened a restaurant within the hospital grounds it was a mega hit !  Big time.

But soon there was to be an even bigger hit as the very first Ronald McDonald House in Britain opened at Guys Hospital.

When a small child needs specialist medical treatment as did Beck it is usually at a hospital far away from the family home. That child needs a parent close at hand so the parent will usually crash out with a sleeping bag on the floor beside the child’s bed. That is how it was for our family. Mum rough slept in Guys Hospital while I tried to look after Beck’s older brothers fifty or so miles up the motorway in Milton Keynes. Our family was torn in two both literally and emotionally. Times were hard.

In the 1970’s at Philadelphia Children’s Hospital in the USA the first Ronald McDonald House opened. Today there are three hundred and sixty-five Ronald McDonald Houses attached to childrens’ hospitals around the world. My family was among the first to benefit from the very first Ronald McDonald House in the country when it opened at Guys Hospital.

Ronald McDonald Houses place an arm of love around families with a child seriously ill in hospital. When families which like ours are split apart Ronald says: Come and stay with me. I will keep your family together and support you all. I won’t charge you a single penny.

Families have their own rooms each with a direct phone to the ward where the child is staying. There are communal areas and kitchens the families can use twenty-four seven. This not only gives incredible love and support to families but to NHS staff within the hospitals caring for the child.

Thinking back to Rebekah’s time in hospital it divides into two distinct areas; pre Ronald McDonald and post Ronald McDonald.

Ronald McDonald the house that love built. That can be said of every single house all round the world.

So is McDonald’s the fast food outlet and Ronald McDonald House Charities one and the same thing ?

NO.

McDonald’s is a major supporter of Ronald McDonald Houses, without this support the houses could not exist BUT they are separate organisations in every other way.

When Rebekah died she left it in her will that the family should support Ronald McDonald House Charities. Her friends set up a support group which they called OurRebekah. Together we raised many thousands of pounds but support does not always have to mean money. I tried to set up many different events but simply could not build a strong enough team about me to make them happen. I found myself trying to be all things to everyone which just did not work.

Rebekah died on 17^th May 2017. Two years after  she died I started to form a plan which I called THE SUN NEVER SETS ON RONALD McDONALD. However, the global pandemic forced things on to the back burner until November 2021 when operations began properly.

The Sun Never Sets On Ronald McDonald. I picked at random ten houses of love:

Ronald McDonald House Calgery Canada

Ronald McDonald House Dublin Ireland

Ronald McDonald House Mumbai India

Ronald McDonald House Nashville Tennessee USA

Ronald McDonald House Auckland New Zealand

Ronald McDonald House Los Angeles California USA

Ronald McDonald House New York USA

Ronald McDonald House Birmingham England

Ronald McDonald House Canberra Australia

Ronald McDonald House Johannesburg South Africa

On any given day, every day there are seven hundred families staying in those houses of love.

With the help of my granddaughter we sign with love SMILE cards which we plaster with all kinds of silly, fun stickers and send them to families. I have no idea how much this project costs, I have never kept account and refuse to hazard a guess. Support does not have to mean money and the support within this project excludes all regard to costs.

When this book is published we will have sent nine batches of SMILE cards, nine times 700 if my mental arithmetic is correct comes to 6,300. If just one of those SMILE cards touches the heart of just one family then the cost, whatever it is, will be worth the priceless love our cards offer.

I try to keep everything a bit anonymous other than saying the project is run in Beck’s memory but needing to fill in a small customs declaration for every envelope if anyone wanted to track me down I guess they could. Indeed they did. I received a beautiful letter from Ronald McDonald House in New Zealand.

There was a time when I would munch my way through a McDonald’s but a few years ago I became a vegetarian so could never be persuaded to eat a cheeseburger and fries which was once upon a time my favourite takeaway food. McDonald’s does have a great vegetarian menu which I applaud. Within this are its hash browns. Nobody but nobody makes a hash brown quite like McDonald’s.

There is, however, a problem with McDonald’s hash browns, a big problem. THEY ARE TOO CHEAP. At 99p they represent a delicious breakfast on a budget. I love McDonald’s hash browns and my best friend Doggie Jake also adores them. At random, usually once a week, I sneak out and drive to my local McDonald’s drive through. (Sorry McD I will give in and allow you to call chips fries but drive through is not spelt drive thru.) There I buy four hash browns, three for me and one for Jake although if he gets his way that becomes two and a half for me and one and a half for him. Total cost 4 x 99p = £3.96. TOO CHEAP ! So I pay £8.96 for our breakfast. I get a five pound note and fold it up very tightly then at the payment window slide it into the Ronald McDonald House collecting box.

There’s nothing quite like a McDonald’s – a McDonald’s hash brown that is. There’s nowhere quite like Ronald McDonald House when a family has a child sick in hospital.

Thank You Ronald. THE SUN NEVER SETS ON RONALD McDONALD.

LOVING OUR NHS MK

Today I am sharing not one but two chapters within my writing project I LOVE OUR NHS – David’s Story.

The clock on my laptop reads 2.36am.

I could not sleep, my head was going round and round and round with a chapter titled LOVING OUR NHS MK. I just had to get up, come downstairs and start writing. Eight hunded and ninety-three words later here it is.

THE WAVE OF LOVE FLOWS IN TWO DIRECTIONS

 Every second of every day our National Health Service cares with LOVE for its patients. Time now for YOU to return that love.

A question. A simple, straightforward and specific question to which there can be only one of two answers.

DO YOU LOVE OUR NHS

Yes or No

During the height of the pandemic posters supporting our National Health Service appeared everywhere. People put signs in the windows of their homes, children drew and painted rainbow pictures, once a week people stood on their doorsteps and clapped for our NHS. But this was a demonstration of support, it was not an expression of love. Sadly, this happy-clappy scenario has vanished.

It is time to replace this expression of support with a wave of love.

DO YOU LOVE OUR NHS

Yes or No

Writing these words in Spring 2022 I would put it to you that our NHS is in a post-war period of austerity. Austerity in a literal sense and austerity metaphorically. The administration system is stretched to breaking point, staff are mentally exhausted and yet every second of every day our NHS does not treat a single patient, it CARES for every patient and cares with LOVE. It is time now for you and it is time now for I to return that love.

DO YOU LOVE OUR NHS

Yes or No 

You may think reading the title for this chapter that it only applies to MK – Milton Keynes. It does not, my home town of Milton Keynes I want to become a launch pad for a nationwide wave of love for our NHS.

I came to live in the New City of Milton Keynes in September 1971 when it was little more than an idea on a piece of paper. I became a patient of what today has become Whaddon Healthcare. Please note the last four letters of my GP’s operation Whaddon HealthCARE.

This is just one of many similar medical centres of operation across the town (Sadly as I write these words Milton Keynes has never become a city but that’s another story). We have one of the finest hospitals anywhere in Great Britain. We have many support organisations such as the air ambulance, assistance dogs, the hospice movement and so much more orbiting around NHS MK.

Go to every community from John-o-Groats to Lands End and you will find similar.

From Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch to the street where you live.

Pre-pandemic I set up a Facebook group LOVING OUR NHS MK to support projects I was running for our hospital. The pandemic war destroyed those projects and put the facebook group way, way onto the back burner. I am now bringing that group back to life and am inviting those who genuinely love our NHS and live in Milton Keynes to join.

If you do not live in Milton Keynes then I invite you to set up a similar group where you live:

Loving Our NHS Birmingham

Loving Our NHS Liverpool

Loving Our NHS Bristol

Loving Our NHS Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch

DO YOU LOVE OUR NHS

Yes or No 

As an old man I am not of the social media generation and too often find myself regarding it all as anti-social media but nobody of any age is ever too old nor too young to love.

If you love our NHS then you will join the Facebook group. If you live in Milton Keynes then LOVING OUR NHS MK is ready and waiting for you. If you do not live in MK then set up a similar group in your town.

The group is there ONLY for people who LOVE OUR NHS to join. It is not for here today and gone tomorrow happy-clappers, it is not here for political gamesmanship. It is here for those who love our NHS to post simple words of love, care and support for NHS staff from our hospital’s CEO all the way up to the person who cleans the floor in my doctor’s surgery.

Government could double, triple, quadruple the funding for our NHS and it still would not be enough to finance all the love needed to care for patients. The government could cut existing funding to ten percent of its present day level but the love of our NHS would not change. You can not put a monetary figure on love.

How much has it cost me to set up this Facebook page ? NOT A SINGLE PENNY.

How much would it cost you to join the Facebook page ? NOT A SINGLE PENNY.

To quote the greatest pop music group the world has ever seen ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE.

I have loved our NHS for thirty-nine years as of today, the day I am tapping out these words on my laptop. I will continue to love our NHS until the day I die and then I shall haunt its operation as a ghost of love.

DO YOU LOVE OUR NHS

Yes or No

If your answer is NO then rip up this chapter and this book, throw it into the recycling bag. While you are at it throw yourself in as well.

If your answer is YES then join the Facebook group and help create the biggest wave of love anyone, anywhere, anytime has ever seen.

I LOVE OUR NHS  DO YOU ?