Letters

Published: 21/03/2002, Volume II2, No. 5797 Page 21

Yet another letter from one-time management guru Roy Lilley (14 February) giving us swine a few more pearls of his outdated wisdom. This time (yawn) Roy applies some dodgy arithmetic to a recently advertised director of modernisation post, and within two or three sentences concludes that, as a result of the heinous crime of advertising this post, 'not a single extra hip operation has been carried out'.

Oh come on, Roy - wake up and smell the coffee, mate. You are past it, and probably couldn't modernise your way out of a paper bag now if you were to be dropped into the operational front line. You were an OK kind of geezer with some reasonable (if outlandish) views in the past, but surely you do not really want to turn into one of those ageing pop-star types who end up on the cabaret circuit as a latter-day management curiosity.

Credibility is the key thing these days, Roy. It is no good telling others how to do it or criticising those who are trying to do it. That doesn't wash anymore. Getting out there and delivering something tangible within an extraordinarily complex and difficult-tomanage NHS is the challenge we face these days.

We can well do without your inappropriate and increasingly irrelevant ranting: 'I suggest a recruitment moratorium' - oh well, duh! - that will sort it all out then, will not it, Roy?

I suggest a moratorium on publishing your letters in HSJ.

Tim New North Shields

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