"Get off your Backside and Become a HP?"

 

Jeremy Kyle, the man once described as a "human bear baiter", justly I think, has been talking about hospital portering on his Talk TV show. (Thanks to a friend who made me aware of this.) He was interviewing Isabel Oakeshott, one of the rare journalists who openly supports Reform UK. They rant with frustration at the double standards in terms of how the government financially supports refugees with enthusiasm at the expense of the native population. That's true and I share their sentiments, but they don't stop there. They then segue to a common notion which is a dangerous train of thought. Kyle argues, and Isabel agrees, that instead of importing foreigners to do service jobs, why not get the British unemployed to do them. I also support this idea and think it's a good one, with one vital condition: these should be proper jobs with a contract and wage. Jeremy and his guest think otherwise. They promote the obscenity of "workfare", an increasingly accepted policy in many countries in which people without work and living off unemployment benefits should be forced into unpaid labour as a proviso for receiving those benefits. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzrdmCzgvTs. (He brings up HPing about three minutes in.)

The practical and ethical problems I have with this proposal are so numerous and vast that I hardly know where to start. Firstly it is beyond insulting to say that the primary cause of unemployment is laziness and if only people "got off their backsides!" to quote Jeremy, the millions on the dole would soon be off it. If this were the case then levels of unemployment would not be directly proportional to the economy. People don't suddenly just become lazy when we get a recession. The government are also effectively saying: "We can't afford to give you a proper job, so can we just pretend we're giving you a job and not pay you? Then it would look as if you were working; that's what matters." We must also refer to previous pilot schemes for such policy that failed. In one, a group of twenty long-term unemployed people were given the chance to live the Jeremy Kyle Dream, unpaid jobs cleaning the streets in a city. However the city's sanitation services had to make twenty of its properly employed staff redundant to create vacancies for the unpaid crews. As a result of workfare being adopted on a grand scale, unemployment skyrocketed as more and more working people were replaced by these civic slaves; and that's not too strong a word to use. In fact an entire sector of this "precariat" has metastasized in societies with workfare. It is unfair, abusive and only makes unemployment worse... unless the government want us all to be slaves for some reason?... What is interesting about this interview is that in the middle of his passionate monologue he mentions HPing as an example of such a profession. Is this a compliment or a slur? Is Jezza saying HP's are such essential workers that our services have to be provided for as a priority, no matter what; or is he listing HPing as one of those menial, invisible, below stairs activities that are so background and unobtrusive that everybody just assumed that they just happen automatically and therefore don't matter, and so can be done by parachuting street urchins into the role and making them do it without a wage? I'm not sure, but knowing Kyle I doubt if he is thinking respectful thoughts as he speaks like this. I do find it interesting that HPing was the first and instinctive occupation that popped into his head as an example. Why? Does he read the HPWA?
See here for background: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2024/09/the-trial-of-jeremy-kyle.html.
And: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2015/02/cameron-pushes-workfare.html.

Blogging Costs Jobs- Review

 

It is now thirteen years since Trystan Swale wrote his article about me entitled Blogging Costs Jobs. A screenshot can be seen in the illustration above and here is the text. The original is long gone. Trystan has a habit of jumping from platform to platform, deleting everything he leaves behind afterwards:

Blogging Costs Jobs
Until very recently Ben Emlyn-Jones was a hospital porter. Then he got sacked from his job; seemingly for some of the content he has posted to his blog and on YouTube. It is a tale that is a lesson to bloggers, podcasters and vidcasters in general. And at a time when securing new employment can be very tough it makes my skin itch.
I know Ben through my attendance at various Skeptics in the Pub events and paranormal conferences. I don't think he'd mind me saying that he believes the New World Order conspiracy; his blog Hospital Porters Against the New World Order makes that abundantly clear. I don't agree with a lot of what Ben writes, but when we see each other we are able to discuss our different world views without getting abusive, running off and throwing tantrums.
The full version of Ben's side of the story is here, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2025/01/thirteen-years-on.html. In brief, it seems Ben was sacked after a complaint was received from a member of the public, alleging he was behaving in an unprofessional way on the internet. The material used against Ben at his disciplinary hearing included three vidcasts he had pieced together for his YouTube channel. As these are freely available on YouTube, I've embedded them below. Watch at least twenty seconds of each and you'll get the idea.
Trytan Swale is a contemporary folklorist and a former paranormal/fortean investigator. This blog is a collection of his thoughts on the dead, the damned, critical thinking and things that probably do not exist.

The tone of novelty in this piece goes to show how recent cancel culture is. Fortunately it seems to be weakening today, but it has done untold damage in its brief rise to power. Some people actually described me as a canary in a coal mine. Oddly enough my experience came at the same time as others were suffering professionally for their conspiratorial beliefs; most notably Kevin Annett, Miles Johnston and Gary Heseltine; see: https://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.com/2023/06/hpanwo-show-514-podcast-gary-heseltine.html and: https://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.com/2022/10/programme-181-podcast-kevin-annett.html and: https://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.com/2023/06/hpanwo-show-510-podcast-bases-ufo.html. I wrote a response to Trystan that with retrospect sounds weak and too reconciliatory. I've added new links to avoid confusion:

Trystan Swale's Article Blogging Costs Jobs
As regular HPANWO-readers will know, I'm different from many of my fellow conspiracy and paranormal researchers in that that I often attend skeptic events. With the rise of conspiratorial awareness and interest in the supernatural, the skeptic movement has similarly burgeoned and organized itself as a reaction, and has become an antithesis of our own world; with conferences, groups, websites, internet forums writers, researchers and speakers all with a surprisingly similar structure, see: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2024/10/qed-conference-2024.html. I've come to know a few of the people involved in this community, like Jack of Kent. One person who keeps dropping in at all of these conferences and events is Trystan Swale.

I first met Trystan in 2010 at the Weird 10 Conference in Warminster. He is an internet radio host and had a stall for his old Righteous Indignation podcast. This appears to be now defunct and Trystan is between shows at the moment. Rather like a mirror of myself, Trystan the skeptic often delves in to the "wacky" world of the "Woo-osphere". Although I've not yet seen him yet at Probe or AV, he does attend the Fortean, "demi-monde"-type conferences like Weird and ASSAP. I always take time out to chat with him and we get on well despite our ideological differences... then again if I disliked everybody who disagreed with me I'd be a pretty lonely person! Also throughout history we've often seen many examples of relationships that appear to be bonded not in spite of, but because of differing opinions. A classic example is Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini. I always remember that there was a boy at my school who was involved in a die-hard Marxist group called the Workers' Socialist League and he spent most of his time hanging out with the leader of the school's Young Conservative club (Well, he was the Young Conservative club to be honest; nobody else ever joined!) When I saw that Trystan has written an article about my recent expulsion from the Hospital Portering Service I was worried for a moment that I was about to get a skepti-bashing, but actually he has let me off quite lightly. He's avoided judgmental statements and treated the incident as a misfortune. He also believes as strongly as I do in free speech; believe me I'd kick up like hell if I heard that a skeptic was about to lose their job for their beliefs, which is why I supported Simon Singh in his legal case. Trystan makes an attempt to see both sides of the story, being sympathetic my own cause, yet putting himself in the shoes of the Management, as he sees it. I suppose I have to accept that in a way my own literary and cinematic style backfired on me. My lack of tact and inhibition, along with my disdain for political correctness, has always meant that I am vulnerable to actions like these. However this was not an oversight on my part, but a deliberate policy; I've always admired satirical comedy. Some of my favourite sit-coms were the serials starring the character Alf Garnett, played by Warren Mitchell. These programmes have been totally disowned by their producer, the BBC, yet I think they're a brilliant indictment on racism and general social ignorance, and I must admit that Alf did inspire my character Butt U Doonuthin in the Microchip a Muslim Day video. I've always treated my viewers as intelligent intellectuals capable of more than just one-dimensional literal thinking, and the mostly positive feedback I've received from them seems to vindicate that. However the problem with satire is that it can always be misinterpreted, either by accident or deliberately: in other words, an attack by false misinterpretation, feigned naivete, "twisting things". This did actually go through my head when I first published Microchip in September 2010. I wondered to myself, What if somebody gets the wrong idea? Have I made it clear through the dialogue, style and costume etc that this is a satire? I hope this won't make people at work think I'm a racist... and so on. A couple of weeks went past and I got lots of positive comments, and no more rude ones than I normally get from the troll element. Also, I knew that within a fortnight or so all my viewers at work would probably have seen it, including many of my bosses, so if there was anything they regarded as a bit dodgy they'd probably have had a quiet word with me and asked me nicely to remove it, or at least make changes to it. My bosses and I generally got on well and if they had any criticism of me it was usually carried out in an informal and cooperative manner. I think if that had happened I'd have probably agreed to their request, either by producing it again in a toned-down remake or putting up a disclaimer of some kind. However after a week or two more I relaxed in the knowledge that my fears were unfounded. Everybody who saw the video understood that the satire was as plain and blatant as I tried to make it.

Trystan has guessed correctly that my film David Icke's New Book is a parody of the cover of one of that author's previous titles, I am Me- I am Free. Also, as I explained, it is not indecent really and if it were YouTube would have removed it. It is there to make a serious point and, as I say, I like to do this in my own way and have no concern for potential oversensitive viewers who take things too literally. Actually if we pursue this line of analysis then almost anything could be seen as offensive when presented in that way. The Big Issue recently published an article about how some Americans are complaining about British children's TV shows, they are supposed to be indoctrinating their youth with subversive radical liberal themes. Teletubbies is said to contain anarcho-syndicalist undertones because Tinky-Winky, Dipsy, Laa-laa and Po live in a state of communal economic and social equilibrium inspired by the conclusion of Marx and Engels' The Communist Manifesto. Noddy and Big Ears are clearly a homosexual couple because they live in the same house and every time they meet Mr Plod there are hints in the dialogue that they would like a civil partnership. To apply that to HPANWO TV: My Che Gue-Veitch films insult both the Scots and French people because I talk with a fake Scottish accent and wear a beret. Also Charles doing the Washing-Up is male chauvinistic and is encoded with extreme anti-feminist propaganda, because it attacks housewives. You see where this mindset could lead? If I comply with it I will spend my whole life tip-toeing around with my shoulders hunched and my arms pressed to my sides, vetting every move I make and word I say just in case one of the billions of people who use the internet decides to complain about it. I will never do that!
 
Trystan tried to see it from the management's point of view, and I think in my report linked above I made an attempt to relate their case to the reader too; you'll notice that I quote them several times when they explained their position to me at the hearing. Actually in the above cases the only reason I didn't cooperate with them was not so much the accusation itself, but the suspicious way that it suddenly arose and the violence with which management reacted against me. I explain in my report, that is not how they normally operate and it's a huge coincidence that this complaint arose at that moment in time and in the form that it did. If I had hurled racial abuse at somebody while on duty then I would have been suspended on the spot in that fashion, and would have richly deserved it. All accusations of gross misconduct are acted upon in that way; so, as I said in my report, I have ask myself if my suspension had another motive. Being instantly suspended in that way was effectively a declaration of war, as was the most serious and hurtful allegation made against me, and also the most outrageous and grotesque, which Trystan does not address in his article. The accusation that I bullied another member of staff. The idea that I would ever do such a thing strikes right at the heart of my persona and self-esteem... and perhaps it's meant to. It becomes yet more curious when you understand that the "complaint" against me must have been fast-tracked. The Trust receives far more complaints and adverse incident reports than you might think; in fact a figure quoted to me by my union was 30,000 a month. That's a thousand a day! I can well believe it because I've received training in Health and Safety. I was a manual-handling officer and trainer for many years and I've had to submit quite a few of these reports myself. I found that the average processing time is about two to three months and this seems to be acceptable. Priority is given to cases of severe clinical hazards that pose severe danger to the wellbeing of patients and personnel. However this complaint against me was dealt with in eight days, maybe sooner because there was a weekend and one day of my leave in between. So my situation was regarded as being of the highest possible importance to Management and it was processed and acted on immediately.

The other night I called a friend in the Truth Movement to tell them what had happened, somebody who used to present an online TV show. They had already found out about my dismissal, but said very forthrightly that they thought there was nothing suspicious about it; they dismissed my concerns and thought that I'd made a mistake. I was dismayed at their attitude, but I didn't get angry with them. I have to accept that not everybody is going to believe me. I can sympathize in a way, especially if one is not familiar with hospitals and how they work. And it is true that I have no direct evidence at all, only overwhelming circumstantial evidence. I still think I did the right thing. I was put on the spot and had to make a decision on what my line of defence would be and I choose that one. I could have ignored all the suspicious coincidences and breaches of normal practice and fought the case on management's turf, but I chose not to. Whatever the rights and wrongs, it's over now, for better or worse.

Soon afterwards I regretted this article, cringing at its overfriendly and beseeching tone. This is not least because a few months later Trystan was to turn against me very suddenly in a completely unprovoked attack, see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2014/12/trystan-swale-on-ben-emlyn-jones.html. I am recording the experience here for posterity. Maybe a reader can learn from both my successes and mistakes.

HP's Cooperative

 

Back in the late 2000's I had this radical and very unrealistic ambition, as I often do. I had just read Antarctica by Kim Stanley Robinson, see: https://www.kimstanleyrobinson.info/node/344. The book is about a man who works for a lousy public sector contractor and sets up a workers' cooperative to bid for the contract. A workers' cooperative is an organization in which everybody who works for it is also an equal shareholder. I thought it would be great to set up a workers' cooperative for the John Radcliffe Hospital porters. This is related to my idea for a guild, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2024/10/hospital-porters-guild.html. I must say I very much identified with the character in the story called "X". Like him I am curious and intellectual, yet I am working class. I cannot fit into academia, yet I am not content to sit around in a pub all day talking about football like most of my friends. X and I are both quite isolated people. (At some point I'll have to write a detailed review of Antarctica.) My inspired dream was, of course, doomed to failure, but I have no regrets for trying. I wrote an open letter at the time to all my EP&DB&SP's and I reproduce it below, slightly edited and improved, for the sake of history and nostalgia.
 
Ben Emlyn-Jones
Level 1 Porter
Level 1 Main Hospital
John Radcliffe Hospital
 
22/9/07
 
Dear Brother or Sister Porter,
 
I'm writing to you because you've expressed to me a desire to know more about the JRHPC- the John Radcliffe Hospital Porters' Company (We can think of a better name later!) I've decided to set up the JRHPC because of the possibility in the future that the Trust management might try to sell our service out to a private contractor. Anyone who was portering at the JR during the Mediclean era will probably agree that that would be a tragedy, both for ourselves and our patients. We simply cannot let this happen. This is not on the cards at the present time because of our current employment with the NHS-Carillion Partnership; we are talking long-term possibilities here, but I think it's wise to prepare now, so that we can act quickly if the danger arises.
 
The JRHPC is a provisional organization, not a trading business, but if it needs to become a trading business it can do so immediately as long as all the organization and planning work is done. We need to think and talk to each other about what the JRHPC will be like. We need to make a business plan, sort out any administration structures and find out what our rights and obligations would be as an independent healthcare provider to the modern NHS. We need to find and enrol people with the knowledge to help us. Maybe in a while we should hold a meeting, but in the meantime we can talk to each other informally face-to-face. You can also email each other or use the forum on my website. There are many obstacles to overcome and no guarantees of success, but hopefully it will never be necessary to even face those obstacles.
 
One of the first and biggest choices we'll need to make is whether we want to be part of the JRHPC as an employee or a shareholder. It's too soon to say which will make us better off financially, but there's no doubt that the more of us are shareholders, the more democratic and self-empowered the business will be. If we all end up as equal shareholders then it will become a workers' cooperative. This would be the ideal situation in my opinion because I've researched workers' cooperatives (see my website) and can understand how much better they are than conventional businesses, in which there are only a handful of shareholders and everyone else just takes a wage without owning a stake in the company, being just a cog in the machine. People in worker's cooperatives are healthier, happier and more productive and efficient. For them work is a creative experience, not just a necessary chore that must be done to survive. If we end up winning the contract and make a success of it then the idea might catch on in other hospitals and even beyond! What we're doing here may one day change the world!
 
As I said above, there's no rush to do this. We can take our time and get it right. The JRHPC is a provisional organization for a hypothetical situation and nobody will have to fork out a penny at the present time. But everyone is welcome to join and if anyone who doesn't receive this letter wants to, let me know. The JRHPC membership is not just aimed at porters, but also the civilians in the office, on dispatch, reception or the Help Desk. They are part of the team too.
 
The first step is simply to start thinking about it, talking about it and building a model in your minds. Remember, nobody knows how to do our job better than ourselves. We can achieve this. Whether we will is not known, but if we don't try then the outcome is certain.
 
Porters forever!
 
Ben

"He Loved his Work"

 

This article is partly an update on this one: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2025/02/beware-catheters.html. In this new article I'd like to explore more the psychology of the catheters and in doing so help you develop more skills for defending yourself from them. I'm particularly reminded of an incident in the early '90's when I was sent on overtime to the MRI- Magnetic Resonance Imager. Among my duties was to clean the scanning rooms after use. I remember that I had to leave my watch and mobile phone etc outside because of the powerful magnetic field in the chamber. It was a bit like cleaning Delivery Suite theatre, but much less visceral. I'll never forget the day when the senior porter, a man I'll call Jameel, approached me with a frown on his face. He said: "Ben, I've had some feedback from the MRI staff, they told me that since you joined the team they have noticed significant improvements." He then turned his back and strutted away. I breathed a sigh of relief. I had been worried that I was in trouble; it turned out I was. I suspect if my employers had known who I was and how I was going to work when I sat in an interview for hospital portering in October 1988, they would never have given me a job; not because I wasn't good enough, but because I was too good. If you are in the NHS, portering or civilian, and you do your job very well, I promise you will get one hell of a lot of aggravation, both from management and in your relationship with your colleagues. A few years afterwards I would experience this again in Theatres, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2017/07/odo.html. As I said in the Catheters article, there are numerous reasons why these people might do what they do, but I did not include motives that are there to see, but are truly baffling. It is not a good business model to punish staff members for being excessively proficient, but the NHS does. It would be bad enough if management did so through a form of unwritten policy, which of course they do; but it also operates tacitly via peer pressure. I truly fail to understand why. I have never felt any such urge when dealing with other people, whether in a professional or social setting. Up until he received this feedback Jameel had been a shy and distant character, happy to let me get on with what I do, enjoying the lightened workload this gave him, but after the feedback he turned into a true catheter. He hung round the MRI scanning suite like a vulture, watching me, poking his head round doors and monitoring every move I made continuously. He and some of the others would burst in almost every half hour and pull me up on something they believed I had done wrong. Like with the previous Theatres example they would demonstrate over and over again the "right way to do it", standing round me with their hands on their hips looking stern. They gave me tours of the chambers the other porters had cleaned, but when I looked I realized that these were not as clean as the ones I had done. Nevertheless, they had been done "right!" while mine had been done "wrong!" Those other chambers had been caressed by the magic hands of mediocrity, so there! It took me a while to realize that my colleagues were trying to persuade me to do my job less well, but they didn't want to say it. This game of silly buggers reached its ultimate nadir when they took photographs of a chamber I had supposedly just done and showed it to me as an example of how I had made numerous mistakes. I soon found out that they had taken those images before I had cleaned, not after; but they all lied to me together. I then told the head porter I did not want any more overtime on the MRI cleaning team. Thank goodness I had never joined them fulltime!

It's amazing to think that such bizarre gaslighting must have involved collusion. At some point Jameel and the other porters must have sat down in a quiet corner and plotted to manipulate and deceive me. The ODO business can be explained as subconscious, an "open secret", so to speak. Maybe even the topping up scam they tried on me in DS could too, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2022/02/lets-just-help-each-other-out.html. If ever caught in a corner and forced to explain why they did it, those DS or theatre porters probably couldn't. They would not be able to put their intention into words. The MRI situation involved the fabrication of actual data. Conversations like that are utterly unthinkable, but they must go on. I'm reminded of a scene in Doris Lessing's The Good Terrorist where one of the character laments about how their home has been attacked by the local council and workmen have filled the toilet bowls with cement; "People did this! People!", see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2020/10/tree-felled-for-hs2.html. Obviously if I had been somebody else on the team I would never have done such a thing and would have warned the target about what was coming. Was the fact that I felt such pride and dignity in being a HP the very thing that generated this hostility in others? Turning again to 20th century literature: The novel The Fountainhead really struck a chord with me. It is by the Russian-American philosopher and author Ayn Rand. It is less famous than her final epic Atlas Shrugged, but perhaps deserves to be considered her masterpiece. The story follows the lives of two young architects, Howard and Peter. Peter is very conventional and does all the ordinary things in order to be successful, but Howard is a passionate maverick and decides to train under a shunned outsider called Henry Cameron. Cameron is hated by his fellow architects despite the fact that he is a genius. I'll never forget the passage in the book where he is described. The narrator gives a long list of his professional qualities and ends with the words: "...but Henry Cameron made a mistake, he loved his work. That was why he fought. That was why he lost." Am I like Henry? Did my brother porters really despise me because I loved my work? Have you, whether HP or civilian, had a similar experience to mine?

Beware the Catheters!

 

During your service as a hospital porter, if take your job as seriously as it should be, it is not just the ravages of management incompetence and malevolence you will have to deal with. Some of your colleagues will also try to take advantage of you, both portering and civilian. They have various motives for doing so. Sometimes it is for profit, in terms of manipulating you into taking on more than your fair share of the workload. Some will do it just to make themselves look good in front of others; sometimes it just makes them feel good, giving them a sense of personal power. I've discussed examples previously, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2022/02/lets-just-help-each-other-out.html. Very often you will be blamed for problems that are not your fault. The reason for this is because you are diligent and reasonable and therefore it is simply easier and quicker to blame you than to take the real culprit to task when all he will do is whine and grumble back. Always be honest, if something is your fault then admit it and apologize; but if it is not then stand your ground like a giant statue. A bit of friendly pranking and ribbing is inevitable in portering because it is an almost exclusively male environment, but some lodge behaviour can cross a line into something more serious. I call problem HP's of this type "catheters", because they take the piss.

Another example happened when I was being trained for theatres and the other theatre porters were teaching me how to use a floor scrubber and "sucker", a vacuum cleaner capable of handling wet material. The scrubber is a machine with a rotating plate on the bottom onto which a brush or abrasive pad it fitted which we use to clean the floors of the operating theatres. I was already familiar with the scrubber and sucker because I'd used them in Delivery Suite, although those were a slightly different design, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2022/02/delivery-suite.html. After showing me how to operate the machines the other theatre porters left me alone to clean a trauma theatre, but minutes later they came rushing back in. "What are you doing, Ben!?" demanded the deputy senior, an alcoholic named Monty (not his real name; and calling him an alcoholic doesn't exactly narrow it down much either). Two other porters were with him watching.  "Eh?" I replied. "You're doing it wrong! Look." Monty snatched the control handle from my grip and switched it on. "Do it this way... watch." He scrubbed a pair of lanes across the floor and then handed it back to me. I carried on, but he instantly stopped me again. "No, no no! Can't you get it right?" Monty once again took the scrubber and demonstrated for me. I was baffled because I couldn't see any difference between how he was doing it and I was; and I said so. I asked him to be more specific, but he just said: "Watch!" We went through this process about five times before Monty was satisfied that I was scrubbing the floor correctly and left me in peace to get on with it. It was only much later that I realized what that conversation was really about. Monty was showing off his expertise and authority in front of the two other porters by aggressively correcting me, even though there was nothing to correct. He was gaslighting me. I was already using the machine properly. The whole thing was a charade; Monty was posing for the two other porters and using me to do so. I could give you numerous other examples of this being done to me. I was too young and naive at the time to understand at first, but later on I learned. Just because I don't want to put others down doesn't mean that some others don't want to do it to me. One thing I've never even considered doing is using a dignity statement against a brother porter, but if there is any time I might have considered it, it was having to fight back against the catheters.

New Lucy Letby Panel

 

See here for essential background: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2024/07/is-lucy-letby-innocent.html.
Because of legal reporting restrictions, nobody in the media was permitted to give out information about the trial of Lucy Letby until the verdict. Once that verdict was reached they all started like greyhounds out of the trap. The restriction was to ensure Lucy Letby got a fair trial, which on reflection seems rather futile. A new panel has been assembled to discuss the case and it has decisively recommended an appeal or retrial. The panel consists of experts in neonatal medicine, including some whose testimony was used in the trial. The leader is Dr Shoo Lee, a University of Toronto researcher. He wrote a paper in 1989 that the prosecution presented against Letby and now Dr Lee says that this evidence was misused. They go on to explain how they believe Letby was simply a victim of bad luck; the record of her duty periods caused it to look statistically significant that she happened to be there when the babies died, but it was just coincidental. Most of the babies died of natural causes and those who didn't were victims of medical malpractice. As I said in the background article, unlike some other people I know, I doubt very much that the hospital were aware of this and used Lucy as a scapegoat; if this were the case we'd see nurses being thrown in jail every week. What's more there is a medical negligence case ongoing against the Countess of Chester trust over the babies' deaths and injuries anyway. Despite this, I would not be surprised if the panel are correct and that the Letby case deserves a judicial review. I'm not somebody who puts down hospital porters, obviously; but I don't think I'm qualified enough to say for sure. However, I do understand that nobody caught Lucy red-handed. In fact there is no direct evidence against her at all. Her journal is not a confession; it could have been a dream diary for all we know. Recording ones thoughts and feelings in a periodic way is often used as a part of psychotherapy. Yes, it was unprofessional of her to fixate on the details of the babies' relatives on social media, but that doesn't mean she had anything to do with the deaths. That action is really just a product of her private thoughts and feelings, as much as her journal is. Dr Dewi Evans, the prosecution's key witness, rejected the findings of Dr Lee's panel. Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8y28ny1n0o. The panel has many supporters including Peter Hitchens and David Davis MP. Here is Davis debating the subject with a believer in the original verdict: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4PqkWV4vY0. We'll now have to wait to see how the Review Commission responds. Apparently the Letby cause has spawned numerous online conspiracy theories... I look over my shoulder in innocent confusion! Nevertheless, we live in a country in which prisons are notoriously filling up with innocent people like a reservoir in a rainstorm. How media silence helped Lucy Letby get a fair trail I cannot imagine. If you are a nurse, or another medical professional including porters (of course!) and civilian PAM's; are you next? Are you going to be arrested and spend the rest of your life in prison because of incompetent and irresponsible police officers and lawyers?

Ghost of a HP!

 

See here for essential background: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2021/12/hospital-pm-scares.html.
Leonore has made another video which is very much a sequel to her previous one about hospitals and morgues. In this video there are two instances that might possibly be caused by the earthbound spirits of hospital porters; and both are well documented. The first comes from a Mexican hospital worker who calls herself a "security guard". On a nightshift she notices one of the wheelchairs in what I think is the entrance moving by itself as if somebody invisible is pushing it. She explains that this has been going on for a long time and so she decides to film it, making a note of the date and time by adding a shot of her computer monitor. This anomaly cannot be explained by the wind or an incline. The doors are shut and the floor is clearly flat, as you'd expect in a hospital entrance. The second takes place at a hospital in Ecuador that Leonore identifies precisely. The photographer is described as a "worker"; and as you know that word is very often used as a placeholder name for a HP, for another example see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2015/06/hospital-worker-sees-ghost.html. It is a very similar case to the first one, except the spiritually autonomous vehicle this time is a patient trolley. The location appears to be a service corridor, not a patient area. This is obviously an internal corridor, ruling out wind. What's more, inclines steep enough to cause this phenomenon through natural means are never present in any area where a vehicle like that would be. You might get them on a loading ramp or something similar (and I could tell you about some fun we used to have with those!). Unfortunately the lighting is not very good and the picture quality poor, but it has a clear soundtrack. The best evidence, as Leonore herself points out, is that the vehicle changes direction. It appears to be on full caster mode and so only a force applied at an angle could do that. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGoNa7suBTE.

The other stories are also worth watching, although they are all civilian orientated. In one case a ghost ruffles the sheets of a bed. There are various dark shadow beings filmed in wards and treatment units. The best, and definitely the scariest, is a dark shadow captured on a security camera showing an acute care ward in Lebanon. A patient is sitting up in bed talking to relatives who are visiting them yet the whole time a dark diminutive, almost childlike black humanoid outline is standing by the bedside completely still and silent. The people in the scene appear not to see it; one of them even walks through it without noticing, showing that it is indeed really there and not a camera artefact. The being casts a shadow on the floor, even though this is also invisible off camera. Leonore thinks it might be some demonic form or another case of the Grim Reaper. The patient died shortly after. On a happier note another amateur film shows an old lady in a Hill-Rom intensive care bed, filmed by her grandson. She is clearly experiencing a deathbed visitation. She is very lucid and describes her visitor as a "pink girl" having a party. The entity's description matches another patient who died previously. She asks her son and grandson if they can see it too and expresses surprise when they can't. The old lady passed away two days later. People seeing strange things shortly before they die is not uncommon and a lot of research has been done into the phenomenon. Sometimes it is angelic forms or people who have already died before. Skeptics say this is simply an halluciantion caused by medication or brain failure, but is it? The visions are all quite alike despite being experienced by people of all racial, geographical and cultural backgrounds. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c28ktKaeAIo. As I said in the previous article, the hospital environment is one of the richest of all for experiencing the spooky and mysterious. I expect Leonore Clay will make another similar video soon about it on The Darkest Secret YouTube channel. I recommend subscribing to her. If any porters at the JRH see vehicles moving by themselves following my own departure from this world (hopefully a long time in the future!), you will know who is doing it!
See here for more background: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2024/11/andy-owens-in-ft.html. 
And: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2015/07/alyson-dunlop-on-hospital-ghosts.html.

And: https://hpanwo.blogspot.com/2023/06/afterlife-portal.html.