What’s going on at MCH?

Plus MPs expenses, we're writing about Rehman again, news in brief, and more

Patients trying to access services and tests from Medway Community Healthcare (MCH) are experiencing massive disruption in doing so four months after the organisation took their IT systems offline. We’ve got more details on what’s been going on below. Further down, we have the first big batch of MP expenses in this parliament, and the numbers for Medway are relatively dull. Plus a long-awaited return to these dispatches for the former MP for Gillingham and Rainham, news in brief, and more.

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What’s going on at MCH?

At the start of the year, we wrote about the ongoing issues with Medway Community Healthcare's (MCH) IT systems, which were causing the business severe problems weeks after an alleged cyberattack caused it to go offline.

Recently, multiple readers have got in touch to tell us that issues are still ongoing, leading to huge delays in patients receiving care that they have been referred for.

MCH House in Gillingham Business Park

MCH provide blood tests, speech and language therapies, physiotherapy, dementia services, diabetes clinics, heart services, neighbourhood nursing, rehab, stroke services, wound clinics, and lots more community healthcare services across Medway. There’s a good chance that if your GP refers you for any kind of testing or care services, you’ll be dealing with MCH.

Except, there’s a good chance you won’t be able to. When given a referral letter from your GP, you are provided with a phone number to call that is managed by MCH, where you leave your details and they book you in for an appropriate appointment.

At the moment, it is apparently impossible to do this. One reader said that they had been trying the number for weeks, and every time, a message is played telling them the system was still offline and MCH are unable to currently book appointments. Another reader who has been waiting for a referral for heart diagnostics since early February told us the same story. Yesterday, Local Authority called the number patients are supposed to use and received the same message, with no instructions provided on what to do instead.

Another reader told us they managed to use another number to get through to speak to someone at MCH, who told them they were unable to book an appointment but that someone would be back in touch to arrange it. Six weeks on, this still hasn’t happened.

Inevitably, this is causing a lot of anxiety for the readers we spoke to. When you need medical care, particularly to identify a potential health issue, it’s not ideal to be left in limbo for weeks on end, with no obvious solution in sight.

Edit 19.03.25: MCH has responded with the following statement from Managing Director Martin Riley:

“We are pleased to be working ‘back to normal’ with access to almost all of our systems and with all of our staff back online. We took the time required to get MCH fully back online in the safest way possible; implementing lessons learned to do all we can to prevent this happening to us in the future. We have established business continuity plans in place for when incidents occur - these cover various scenarios, including IT incidents. We made use of these business continuity plans both internally and in terms of our work with partners across Medway and beyond; to enable continued, safe patient care. While access to electronic systems was limited, staff had full access to resources to take paper notes where required and these notes are being uploaded to electronic records as part of our recovery.

As a result of the incident, (where we detected suspicious activity as part of our routine monitoring), NHS England oversaw a thorough and in-depth specialist investigation. This investigation closed in late December and demonstrated no evidence of unauthorised access to patient data. We also received confirmation from the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) that they will not take any formal enforcement action and that they consider the matter closed.

Throughout the incident, all of our services remained open and every effort was made to minimise disruption for patients and to avoid additional waiting times. We take note of the phone message issue on our phone lines which has now been updated, however, we’ve received no formal complaints from patients who can’t access care so can’t comment on individual situations.

We would like to thank all those who use our services for their patience and support. We would urge patients to contact us if they do have concerns or feedback regarding their care - they can do so via 0300 123 3444 or via MEDCH.customercare@nhs.net.”

We want to speak to anyone who has been experiencing issues accessing services and appointments with MCH. If you’ve been affected by these issues, please get in touch via hello AT localauthority DOT news. We’re always happy to speak off the record in the first instance.

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First round of MP expenses are mostly boring

How much MPs can claim via the expenses system is always a fraught subject. Over the years, we’ve seen all kinds of spurious claims put through expense accounts, and while the system has been tightened up in recent years, some questionable sums still make it through.

Following the General Election last year, the first significant update of the expenses register via the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority reveals that our three new MPs haven’t yet tried to claim anything particularly unexpected.

Gillingham and Rainham MP Naushabah Khan has been the most frugal of the three, claiming £8,295.69.

The bulk of this was staffing costs, £3,000 going towards pool staffing services and £1,560 on training. Elsewhere, £2,000 was spent on casework software, something all three Medway MPs signed up for. Beyond that, it’s all pretty boring, with her office rent only running £450 per month and the obligatory stationery and venue hire costs.

Over in Chatham and Aylesford, MP Tristan Osborne has managed to burn through £9,614.66 entirely on office costs.

Given he hasn’t yet claimed any staffing costs, these are quite remarkable figures. Much of the difference is explained by getting a physical presence up and running faster, meaning he’s had more months of paying £780 to Chatham Historic Dockyard (in the neighbouring constituency of Rochester and Strood) for his constituency office. Elsewhere, he’s claimed over £2,200 for office furniture and managed to do a lot of printing.

Finally, Rochester and Strood MP Lauren Edwards has spent £9072.72 on office costs while again not spending anything on staffing.

Most of the costs here aren’t particularly eye-catching, other than perhaps spending nearly £5,000 on a website. Now, you may think that’s a lot of money for a website, and it certainly is, but it’s also hard to deny that it’s a very nice website. Just don’t go looking for many mentions of Labour or any party branding on it.

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Uhoh, we’re covering Rehman Chishti again

It’s no secret that we have been saddened by the lack of Rehman Chishti content since he lost his role as MP for Gillingham and Rainham. While he was a popular feature of these editions while he held that position, we’ve tried not to breathlessly cover his every move since he returned to being a private citizen.

However, it would be remiss of us not to mention two moments of classic Rehman from this week.

First is this utterly superb passage about him in the recently released diaries of former Conservative Chief Whip Simon Hart, who recalls Rehman’s ‘personal statement coming soon’ prank from last year:

Panic sets in as Rehman Chishti [Gillingham and Rainham] makes a strange X announcement. ‘Personal statement coming soon,’ he says.
Given his first position in politics was as a Labour councillor we all assume another defection is on the cards. So, we press all of the usual panic buttons.
Emma starts to prep the hostile questions document. His whip is tasked with tracking him down. CCHQ does a quick by-election prep plan and we brief the PM’s team. The media is all over us so we prepare and issue a holding line. And then we wait.
Turns out he’s announcing his engagement. Twat. Until this moment, I was unaware that Reh had such a sense of humour.

Thank you to the not inconsiderable number of readers who sent that over to us in the past week.

It’s something of an open question about whether or not Medway’s former MPs would have another go once the opportunity presented itself. While we can safely rule out Tracey Crouch making a comeback for now, it is clear that former Rochester and Strood MP Kelly Tolhurst has eyes on a return. Word reaches us that Rehman is of the same mindset, believing he can sweep to victory in Gillingham and Rainham once again at the next General Election.

Of course, five years is a long time to wait around, so he’s got a new venture off the ground: Rehman Chishti Leadership Academy & Strategic Advice.

Yes, it is really called that. It’s on Companies House and everything.

rehmanchishtimp

A post shared by @rehmanchishtimp

Rehman is offering a free leadership skills training course for students aged 15 to 18 from Gillingham and Rainham. Of course, these things aren’t without caveats. The students have to write an essay on what makes a good leader and email it to his Hotmail address like it’s 1999.

Excitingly, his website has also been updated to promote his new venture, and it includes some wonderful gems like his experience page listing that he was a ‘2022 candidate for UK Prime Minister.’ This is quite a way to describe a leadership campaign announced via a windswept video in a park and ending a few days later when he attracted precisely zero support.

Quite what leadership advice a man who couldn’t attract even a single vote for his leadership can offer remains an open question, but we wish good luck to the 20 lucky students who get to take part.

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In brief

🏘️ Proposals have been submitted to convert the former St John Fisher School building on Maidstone Road in Chatham into 11 flats. The plans also propose building eight houses alongside, with the remainder of the site allocated for a new Aldi store.

🚒 Firefighters responded to reports of a ‘loud explosion’ on Medway City Estate last night. However, they were unable to ascertain any cause or locate any fire.

🛒 Work has begun to renovate the southern entrance of Hempstead Valley Shopping Centre. The move is part of a scheme to bring Home Bargains to the complex in the autumn.

🎱 The former Riley’s Snooker Hall in Gillingham is on the market for £3m. The venue has planning permission for 57 flats, which will presumably cost slightly more than the asking price to build.

🏢 Residents at the newly completed Victory Place in Gillingham have been left without water across repeated weekends. The building is home to 89 households, and the issue has developer Legal and General and landlord Southern Housing blaming each other.

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Medway Question Time is coming soon

Thanks to everyone who has already booked a ticket to our next Medway Question Time event. It always feels like a tough ask to get people to spend a weekday evening in a room for a panel discussion about the issues facing Medway, but you wonderful readers always end up coming through. A sign, if ever there was one, that we have the best readers.

It’s roughly four weeks until our first live event of 2025, where we’ll have a panel of significant Medway figures answering your questions. Hit the link below to book your free ticket and to submit your question for the night.

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More Authority

For our weekend interview, we sat down with Robbie Lammas, Conservative councillor for Princes Park. We discussed how he ended up representing the ward, why he no longer works in Westminster, and why he went to the US to campaign for Donald Trump in the recent election.

Later this week, we’ll examine the impact of covid on Medway five years into the pandemic. On Friday, our regular arts and culture briefing will be with you, and on Sunday, we’ll be interviewing Tracey Bullock, Chair of Medway Rugby Club.

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Footnotes

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Music that soundtracked the creation of this edition: Can’t Make Any Promises by Radiator Hospital, Sick Scenes by Los Campesinos!, and Seems Unfair by Trust Fund.