Today in Parliament, Lucy Allan MP asked Chief Secretary to the Treasury Simon Clarke MP to ensure that future spending on healthcare in Telford must be conditional on protecting A&E services for people in Telford.
Lucy has also issued a press release outlining her position below:
Lucy Allan MP said:
“It is essential that Telford residents have access to A&E services. Any plan to reconfigure hospital services in Shropshire must set out how Telford will access A&E services.
Rightly, a project with escalating capital costs needs to be properly scrutinised and value for money must be achieved for taxpayers. The Government has already awarded £312m for this scheme. The Trust now wants at total of £560m. My constituents will pay for this and we must see not only value for money but decent local services.
The Future Fit scheme envisages a cutting edge critical care unit on the Welsh border, which will not be used by Telford residents, as we use Wolverhampton for life threatening critical conditions.
Hospital bosses must justify their plan from the perspective of Telford residents, which over many years they have failed to do. I have naturally been in discussions with Ministers, throughout the last 6 years, and indeed raised the issue with Treasury Ministers in Parliament only today. It is my understanding that there will be no more taxpayers’ cash allocated to this project and this must be right.
SaTH is not in a position to embark on a complex, controversial hospital reconfiguration at this time. The costs are spiralling. Both the County hospitals are rated inadequate. The Trust is in Special Measures. The backlog is far worse in Telford than elsewhere, as orthopaedic surgery is still cancelled at the PRH, we have a desperate overload at A&E causing severe ambulance delays and a GP practice with 60,000 patients that is struggling to answer the phone and the management of both Trust and CCG is new to post.
This is a hospital trust that needs to get the basics right first. All extra NHS spending for Shropshire must tackle providing basic care to those who need it most. State of the art buildings to serve West Shropshire and Powys, and which most people in the County will never use, cannot go on sucking in taxpayer money and management time, when patients are being seriously failed by lack of basic care. It is important to remember that Wales has a separate Labour-run NHS that should be providing proper healthcare for its residents and not seeking to use NHS England facilities at the expense of people in Telford.
I do not support any extra cash for the critical care unit. If my constituents are to pay an extra healthcare levy from April next year, the money must be used to deliver better care in Telford, not state of the art buildings on the Welsh border. I will continue to raise my strong concerns at every level.”
You can see Lucy Allan's work on Telford's Princess Royal here
You can watch Lucy's question and the Minister's response above.
