‘Battle on to restore faith’ over cash crisis facing NHS

Senior figures from the NHS in North Yorkshire have attempted to allay concerns that key services will be shifted from Scarborough to York amid plans for the new national regime to be launched in the spring.

Members of an influential health watchdog have told the Yorkshire Post the reassurances provided a cautious optimism that services for coastal communities will be protected as much as possible.

But they maintained a spectre of uncertainty still hangs over the NHS in North Yorkshire, which has been faced with an escalating financial burden as an ageing population places intense pressure on services.

The Scarborough and Whitby branch of the North Yorkshire Local Involvement Network (LINk), which is funded by the Department of Health to represent the public, has voiced concerns that healthcare could be undermined in the new structure, which begins from April 1.

A public meeting was held in Scarborough on Friday evening when senior officials from the primary care trust, NHS North Yorkshire and York, and the York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust addressed a 200-strong audience.

Assurances were given after the Yorkshire Post revealed in November that Scarborough General Hospital’s accident and emergency had been placed under threat. Health chiefs have subsequently maintained the department was on a long list of proposals and is no longer at risk. The PCT’s board will meet on Tuesday next week to pinpoint where cutbacks will have to be enforced.

The foundation trust’s chief executive, Patrick Crowley, was adamant there is not a list of services to be transferred now Scarborough is the responsibility of his organisation. He said: “We recognise York is overcrowded and it’s inconceivable we would centralise services at York away from Scarborough.”

But the chairman of the Scarborough and Whitby branch of LINk, Leo McGrory, maintained there is still a huge amount of uncertainty over future health provision.

He said: “In the changing face of healthcare nobody knows what the position will be in a year’s time. People’s confidence has to be restored, and they (the NHS officials) made some inroads in doing that.

“They were as transparent as they could be, but it is a cautious confidence that people have. The most pressing issue in North Yorkshire is funding, and this remains the biggest challenge for future years.”

NHS North Yorkshire and York is England’s most rural PCT area and receives significantly less than other more deprived and urban areas. The trust gets £1,417 per head of population compared to a regional average of £1,690, while the PCT covering Barnsley receives £1,903. In Sheffield, the PCT is awarded £1,701 and in Leeds the figure is £1,552.

In November, the Yorkshire Post revealed a long list of proposals which could see hundreds of hospital beds axed forcing patients to travel miles for essential treatment, while community hospitals and minor injury units could be shut or radically re-shaped.

The leaked consultants’ report pinpointed an overnight closure of Scarborough’s A&E department as a potential cost-cutting measure, but health chiefs are adamant this will not happen.

The MP for Scarborough and Whitby, Robert Goodwill, said: “When I was first told of the idea by the Yorkshire Post my exact words were ‘over my dead body’. If you are going to pay consultants a quarter of a million pounds to come up with ideas they should not be putting up stupid ones like closing A&E. If we get any more stupid ideas like that, it will be over my dead body as well.”

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