NLHF
The Quoodle column, as I explained patiently to Robin Day on BBC-2, is basically one man's enthusiasms and prejudices. It was the first of these that led me last weekend to Harrogate, to attend (in the role of my wife's husband) the annual conference of the National League of Hospital Friends. Long ago I prOmised the League that all the petty restrictions that stopped them from giving the fullest support to the hos- pitals would be swept away—and they have all gone. Long ago I set them their target: that no hospital should be without its League of Friends to supplement and to give warmth to the pro- vision of the state. We are not• there yet, but we have made enormous progress, and the movement snowballs on.
The conference was a great success. Harrogate is vastly more attractive than London as a con- ference centre, and only the weather was vile. It was the steady advance in the provision of Leagues of Friends in the mental hospitals that was perhaps the most comforting part of the progress report. Mrs. Karlin, who heads up voluntary hospital effort in Minnesota and made the most effective of the conference speeches, told me that more than anything else she had been impressed on this her first visit to Britain by the friendliness of the atmosphere in many of our mental hospitals. They still vary enormously, but it's a fairly safe bet when you visit a really good one that it has a League of Friends.
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