IT IS a hard year for my friend Claire Throssell, who lost her mum in September and this month marks the tenth anniversary of that terrible fire, started deliberately by their own father, which killed her two sons Jack and Paul.

Since Claire could gather herself up, she has fought against courts to protect children in domestic abuse situations because, as in her case, judges gave access rights to those who should never have been entrusted with the charge of their own children.

It is in the memory of her lads that Claire vowed that no other family should go through what they did.

The boys are still alive in our memories because of Claire, thrust into a limelight she did not want but they power her to keep on keeping on.

I doubt there is anyone more eloquent and determined to do what she is doing, fighting a rigid establishment, and, sadly, no one more qualified.

But changes to the law have been made because of Claire and lives have been saved.

But how she must despair when she reads of a case that has slipped through the net and another child has died at the hands of a parent. She is a magnificent woman and still she ploughs on when she must be in deep grief for her mum, who had to go through the past ten years with her, feeling her pain because that is what mums do.

We are only as happy as our unhappiest child someone said to me once and it is true.

Claire, our awe for you increases daily. And wherever your mum is now, she remains part of you, as do your boys, and they – and us – are with you all the way, love.

There was a power cut on Sunday morning. It lasted a minute, but obviously it set all the burglar alarms off on the estate nearby.

And as I was out walking the dog later, some of those alarms were still ringing, presumably because no one was in to turn them off.

And I thought how ‘funny’ that a house alarm going off was a huge indicator to any passing burglars of an unattended property.

As Alanis Morissette once sang, ‘Ironic’?

Is it any wonder that the Chron carried a story last week titled ‘A and E pressure is not going to let up’.

Is there any wonder? People can’t get a doctor’s appointment, even when they REALLY need one.

I know this because of the times I had to ring up for my mum. In chronic pain, there wasn’t a chance she’d get a doctor to come out to her because I wasn’t quick enough to get through in a morning, battling against everyone else ringing up.

And if you were lucky enough to get an appointment, it would be a telephone consultation first.

Mum’s doctor once gave her a referral for X rays for horrendous back pain. A week later she still hadn’t even had a date and was suffering so much.

I rang up to chase and was told it would at least another week. I unashamedly worked the system for her after the person in the X ray department hinted at what I should do.

I took mum up to A and E and though we had to sit there a long while, she got her X ray and was on the appropriate meds within hours.

And I’d have done it again if she’d needed it. Whenever this overall of the NHS is going to start, it can’t be soon can it?