Sir – The main headline (January 13) reported on the county council’s abysmal record on hospital bed-blocking, showing that the facility for post-operative social care, a county council responsibility, to be among the worst in the country; I am sure that all the patients will be delighted to read, that having failed miserably to provide adequate after-care, they intend to investigate “how older people can avoid being admitted into hospital beds”.

I did not know that OAPs volunteered to have a spell in hospital; how naïve I am, I always believed that admission to hospital (except for A&E) was a clinical decision taken by GPs and consultants.

As an elderly, but fiercely independent, man who was diagnosed with a condition needing major spinal surgery in August 2010 and is suffering considerable pain, loss of balance and mobility, reading councillor Arash Fatemian’s words of wisdom did little to encourage me, having been recently advised by the Department of Neurosciences at the John Radcliffe that my procedure has been put back from December 2010 to April 2011. County council spokesman, Marcus Mabberley’s comments only remind me of the old bureaucratic phrase: ‘if you cannot solve the straightforward problem invent a much bigger one’!

I am sure the council leader will be unable to resist replying, but I will not hold my breath waiting for an apology for such outrageous statements.

Peter Tothill, Stadhampton