LOCAL RAG SOOTHES NHS CRISIS

CRUMBRIA: 23.6.2026

DESPITE standing outside Number 10 yesterday and declaring NHS waiting lists as solved under his watch, not everyone in North Crumbria believes Keirnocchio.

Despite another expensive changing of the guard here, the local NHS Trust remains firmly in the dog house.

North Cumbria Disintegrating Care Trust — runs hospitals in Carlisle and Whitehaven, along with Cumberland’s cottage hospitals.

In March, the Trust stood a lowly 128th in a table of 134 acute trusts.

It’s not a reflection of care standards – just management.

Despite multi-million pound investments in the estate, as recently as March patients in North Cumbria were still waiting:

Too long in A&E
Too long for a bed
Too long for cancer care
Too long for hospital appointments
Too long for tests and scans
Too long for planned operations
Gaps in senior medical positions are fuelling poor performance
Critical roles are being plugged with expensive agency staff
Broader staff morale has tanked

What’s more, Trust bigwigs are grappling with the slightly troublesome issue of a £90m blackhole.

Crumberland councillors – no experts themselves in complex health services – were updated last week on the dire state of affairs.

By last week’s meeting, senior NHS medics were reported as telling Councillors that the Trust had climbed to 120th in the table.

Even on that rosier version, North Cumbria is 15th from bottom.

In its report of the meeting, the News & Shrug had the brass neck to tell readers that the senior medic was “The most confident he has ever been” about the Trust’s direction of travel!

“We know there is lots to do but we believe we know what the problems are,” said the smooth-talking senior medic who had been dispatched to face the Council’s so-called “scrutiny” committee.

The alleged former newspaper believed all this and quietly wheeled all the uglier details behind a curtain.

Thanks to its own shortage of expertise in key positions, the local rags no longer have churnalists experienced enough to snap on the rubber gloves and light-up the anoscope when an NHS crisis unfolds on its doorstep.

You’ll get the treacly bedside manner in spades.

Just don’t expect them to give you the killer diagnosis.

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