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FRIDAY, January 11, 2013

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Serving South Yorkshire

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Another Posh signing for Millers...

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Council says sorry to grooming victims

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Relatives will never receive headstone

DISTRAUGHT members of a family caught up in a national headstone scandal have spoken out about their nightmare ordeal.

OUR NIGHTMARE
EXCLUSIVE
by DAVE DOYLE
that the firms collapse has affected nearly 100 bereaved families, stretching from Dundee to Dover. Furious customers accused business owner Dave Blakey of scamming them and are seeking compensation. Its hard to put my feelings into words, said Jackie. How can anybody do something like this? Im just so angry and so sad. The family first heard about the companys plight when son Mark (42) sent an email confirming when they wanted the stone erected. Mark, of Pingles Crescent, Thryq Continued on page 5 DEVASTATED: Jackie Edwards at her husband Peters grave with son Mark 130028-3

Her family paid 1,470 for a headstone to be erected on his grave at St Leonards cemetery, Thrybergh. But it never arrived and the family discovered that Lincolnshire-based stonemasons Simply Memorials have stopped fulfilling orders, citing financial trouble. I really wanted the headstone up for Peters birthday, but that hasnt happened, said Jackie. An online campaign website claims

Jackie Edwards (64), of Leverton Way, Dalton, lost husband Peter Edwards (66) to cancer last March.

Campaigners from the Trade Unionists and Socialists Coalition presented the petition to the council of governors meeting at the hospital on Wednesday. TUSC supporters have collected the signatures over the last two months from people in

A PETITION of more than 3,000 names collected in protest at 750 job losses at Rotherham Hospital has been handed to health bosses.

Petition protest at hospital job losses

Rotherham opposing the cuts in services and jobs being proposed by the Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust board. In October Brian James, then chief executive, announced the trust needed a smaller hospital, with substantially fewer beds and a smaller workforce to save 50m over the next four years. TUSC claim Mr James then retired on a fatcat pension leaving 3,500 staff not knowing whether they would even have a job in 2013.

Hundreds of nurses, therapists, clerical and technical staff and some managers were then issued with at risk of redundancy notices in the week before Christmas. Some 500 jobs are at risk with possibly around 200 compulsory redundancies, including front-line nurses, health visitors and community staff, say TUSC. Many staff remaining will face down-bandq Continued on page 4