Updated information on the nature of dentistry in Thanet.

Finding a dentist in Thanet is hard. It's harder still if you have no car and little money. Just currently there are, according to PALS, exactly no dentists taking on NHS patients in Thanet.

NHS - Second Class Dental Service

For those of us dependant on the NHS for dental services it is likely to be apparent that we are very much the recipients of a second class standard of service.

You cannot get checkups for you or your children. You can only get dental treatment once you are in pain and then you have to phone at 8am and keep trying until you get through - after that you will be told when the appointment is and you had better be able to get there early to fill out the paper work.

The number to call appears to have changed several times. The current number is 01233 667997 and you will need to call after 8am but before 9am. Any time after nine in the morning and you would need to be very lucky to get an appointment at the Ramsgate dental access clinic.

Keep reading to find out about New NHS friendly dentists opening in Thanet this year

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» Continue Reading: Thanet Dental Update

Thanet District Council does not have Officers with the skill, time or insight to do the job according to a source inside the council.

Thanet District Council has spent nearly £1 million on consultants in just three years, Finance boss Martin Wise has told thisiskent.co.uk because the council does not know how to deal with the tasks set before it.

According to ... Finance boss Martin Wise said that Thanet's council needs consultants to help it understand new legislation being introduced by the central Government and the authority not having officers with the skills to deal with it.

Let's stop and recap in case we missed that. Mr Wise says that the current officers of Thanet District Council lack the skills to do the job.

Is it me or did that come dangerously close for political speak for "not fit for office"?

Ignoring, for a moment that we have a Conservative council saying its all the fault of the Labour Government as normal (log, eye, own), let's think about that.

If the 50 plus councillors that stood at the last election have insufficient skills to do the job then what, in all fairness, did they think they were doing standing in the first place?

Mr Wise is also quoted as saying of the consultants hired: We use these people to unravel the legislation and how to proceed with it. They do the donkey work. These are huge pieces of work that take a lot of time and all our officers have a day job to do and we don’t have the people to do the work.

Is it really that the entire council is made up of people lacking the skills to get the job done or is it that it lacks in-favour-conservatives to get the job done? It seems to me that our council, according to Mr Wise, is controlled by people unqualified for the power and responsibility that they hold.

According to the article Council "leader" Sandy Ezekiel argues that central government should let local authorities get on with the job rather than bogging them down with unnecessary spending. (Such as overpaying for property in Margate, Sandy?)

It's no good blaming the government, blaming the press, blaming everyone involved when it long ago became clear to everyone that the problem was a lack of responsibility. Rather than spending every ounce of energy fighting the other party maybe someone would like to actually get something done for once? Then we'd not need to try and kick up dust to cover the fact that no one is doing their job and they are getting paid very nicely for it too.

If Sandy and co are unable to complete the work the council must undertake they should step down today and call for a new election to find someone who can do the job.

Maybe it's time that Sandy's gang put pride aside and looked to the whole of the council to find the skills and time that they need. I happen to know that at least one Labour Councillor is currently unemployed and would probably jump at the chance to show his Tory counter-parts how it all works.

Alternatively maybe Mr Wise and Cllr Ezekiel might consider the inaugural Kent Poker Cup a poker tournament at Thanet's G Casino as this holds as much hope of a good return on investment as any other we seem to have been shown by Thanet District Council of late.

If I have to become a councillor to see that this lack of skill and ability is sorted out I shall be very cross indeed.

113-year-old Margate Football Club is once more in danger.

That's the message from Jeremy Jacobs. In his blog post Margate Super hero he looks back at the glory days of Margate FC and left-half, Bryan Clifton, the man with the hardest shot in non-league football.

As I understand it, Margate Football Club will be wound up in the High Court on April 29th, unless it pays a figure rumoured to be in the region £100,000, to HMRC before or on that date. I’m sure the Club’s Chairman, Keith Piper, will do everything he can to save the Club from extinction and with it 113 years of footballing history.

The club is hoping to raise the £100,000 it needs by issuing shares but this has left supporters with a number of unanswered questions. Not least of which is what happens if this does not work?

Margate are playing Ramsgate at home tomorrow, the kick off is at 1pm

Unacceptable. It is the only way I can describe the behaviour of police during the G20 protests.



From what I can see this was an ugly and aggressively policed protest of the kind I am more accustomed to seeing in less stable countries. additional video footage here

Another eyewitness, Ashley Parsons, said: "The violence perpetrated against so many around me over that hour was sickening and terrifying.

"Without warning, from around midnight, the police repeatedly and violently surged forwards in full riot gear, occasionally rampaging through the protest line and deliberately destroying protesters' property, some officers openly screaming in pumped-up rage."

Outside the Bank of England, thousands were held for up to eight hours behind a police cordon, in a practice known as "kettling". Parents with children and passers-by were told by officers on the cordon that "no one could leave".

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» Continue Reading: Unacceptable.

Thanet District Council may be able to crow about the quality of sea water for swimming in but Thanet might not be able to boast the same thing about our drinking water.

Only recently I saw a headline in the local advertising supported (free) newspaper that more or less said that most of the contaminants in our drinking water came from us.

Each of us flushing a bit of this and a bit of that down the sink has added up, it seems, to more toxic rubbish in our drinking water than the efforts of a number of well known industrial groups.

The truth is we are all on thin ice and so perhaps it is time to widen our sights a little and address the entire picture. For example no one locally has commented on the fact that the industrial complex of "Thanet Earth" not only uses more water than it can source from local reserves but will need to drain local marshland for further water too. read more.

Yes those big complexes sat on our water supply could dump a heavy load into our water and ruin it for generations to come - that worries me. However, what also worries me is that we might slowly ruin it for generations to come anyway.

What I'd like to know from the Save Thanet Water Supply supporters is what about the marsh, what about us sticking our own household crap into the water what about the unsustainable "Thanet Earth" supply demands?

It only takes one failure to hurt our water and one big enough failure to take it away. We can therefore afford no failures to protect our water.

We each need to protect our water from our own actions. Keep reading to find out why this might never happen.

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» Continue Reading: Who cares for our water?

As far as I know this podcast is another first for Thanet found at Thanet Star.

With a little luck and some tinkering tomorrow (perhaps) you should be able to enjoy a seven and a bit test "broadcast" that you can take away and enjoy on your MP3 player.



Download this episode (right click and save)

Credits

Thanks to:

Tony Flaig of Big News Margate and Thanet Observer for writing blog posts worthy of commenting on,

Steve from Stop Manston Expansion Group for getting in there early with his opinion

This show used:

Epic Climax by Neurowaxx, windish by William Berry and Original compositions by Matt B

We've raised a lot of questions in this show: The validity of the standards board, The telling off that Sandy Ezekiel got from said standards board, Lorry parking in car spaces in Ramsgate, The expansion of Manstone airport, and the very tense nature of Thanet politics.

We've only just started to touch on these subjects and I'd love to hear what you have to say. The number to call is 0844 884 9342 - select the option to leave a message and share your views.

Have you had a great or a shocking encounter with solicitors, statuary services (social services, for example) or any organisation about whom little is often written?

If you have then I want to hear from you.

Would you recommend the last solicitor you spoke to?

Could you honestly say that you have had a good encounter with social services?

Have you got a story about help above and beyond with a sure start centre?

Perhaps it's the other way round and you are deeply unhappy with the level of service you have received. Let's put a human face on these things and share our stories. I can keep you name out of it if you want or make it public - it's up to you.

Let's talk