Try using other spices like chilli, cumin and lemongrass for variations on this soup.A good knob of butter1 small leek, roughly chopped and washed1 small onion, peeled and roughly chopped30g root ginger, scraped and finely choppedA few sprigs of thyme1kg butternut squash, peeled, seeded and roughly chopped1/2litre vegetable stock (a good quality cube will do)Salt and freshly ground black pepperGently cook the leek, onion, ginger and thyme in the butter until soft, add the butternut squash and vegetable stock, bring to the boil, season with salt and pepper then simmer for 20 minutes.Blend the soup in a liquidiser until smooth, then strain through a fine meshed sieve. Reheat the soup and adjust the consistency with a little vegetable stock or water if necessary and re-season with salt and pepper.. These work well as a starter or main course. Add the vegetable stock, season with a little salt and pepper and simmer for 20 minutes.Dilute the cornflour with a little water, stir into the sauce and simmer for another 5 minutes.

Vancancies for midwives have reached record levels because poor pay and overwork is causing an exodus from the profession, the Royal College of Midwives warned yesterday. A survey by the RCM shows that more maternity units than ever have unfilled posts and the national vacancy rate for England, at 6.3 per cent, is the highest recorded by the college.The problem is greatest in London, where 13 per cent of positions are vacant. But shortages have worsened in every other region of the country, and particularly the South-east, a college survey showed.Among those leaving the profession are experienced midwives in their forties and fifties who have become “increasingly disillusioned”, and newly qualified staff who are quitting to pursue other careers.The shortages mean that few women have the sole attention of a midwife if they give birth in an NHS hospital, RCM officials said.The Government has set a target of recruiting 2,000 extra midwives by 2004 and a total of 10,000 over the next seven years. As part of this campaign, ministers hoped to have 500 additional staff in posts by this September.But the RCM said that the latest figures from the Department of Health showed that the total number of midwives in posts had fallen from 23,075 midwives last September to 23,030 in March this year, a decrease of 45 staff.Dame Karlene said: “These figures concern us greatly as this is likely to affect the care which mothers and newborns receive. As those leaving are both experienced and newly qualified midwives, this is putting more pressure on those who continue to practise.”She added: “We must make midwifery a more attractive profession to enable us to stop this exodus and ensure that Government recruitment targets are met.”The RCM says midwives, who are likely to earn no more than £25,000, must be given substantial pay rises as part of negotiations to introduce new terms and conditions for nursing staff.Dame Karlene added: “The Government must demonstrate that it values midwives and the work they do by ensuring that negotiations on new pay and conditions for NHS staff deliver for midwives.”Jacqui Smith, a Health minister, said the Government was determined to meet its targets to increase staffing levels.

She said: “We may be seeing some short-term problems but overall we have seen considerable increases.”The trend is in the right direction. What’s more important, we are taking action to make sure that continues, more midwives in training, action to bring back into the profession midwives who have left it.”Ms Smith said she accepted that the Government faced “a challenge” to meet its target of increasing the number of midwives in the health service.. The chief executive of one of the first hospitals built through the private finance initiative has resigned after learning that his job had disappeared in a reorganisation. He told staff he was leaving “with some sadness” and admitted the last two years had been “challenging”.When the 489-bed hospital opened in August 2001 there were immediate accusations that it was too small to cope with demand, despite being a big improvement on the Dryburn hospital it replaced, a crumbling, dowdy building with 665 beds.Critics said the size of the new hospital represented cost-cutting by the private sector and illustrated all that was wrong with the private finance initiative. But managers insisted that the hospital would have been the same size had it been built with public money.However, the position changed with the publication of the NHS Plan in July 2000, when the hospital was already well on the way to completion, which signalled major expansion for the NHS backed by huge new investment.Ken Jarrold, chief executive of the County Durham and Tees Health Authority, said: “Had we known in 1998 [when the hospital was planned] that the Government was going to invest in the NHS to the extent they have, or the scale of their ambitions on targets for the NHS, then Durham would have been built differently.”The episode illustrates how fast demands can change, in this case for political reasons, and how risky building new hospitals can be. Managers now admit that the new hospital needs another 50 beds. A spokesman for the North Durham trust said: “We have got to use the capacity we have got first but it is possible that in the future there might be a modest expansion.”That view follows a report commissioned by the health authority from Ari Darzai, the Government’s adviser on surgery, which was published in February, because of concerns about capacity.