Go-ahead hopes for £9m cancer centre

Plans for the new £9m oncology unit at Harrogate Hospital is going before a Harrogate Council planning committee on Tuesday.

It is being funded with a £3.5m donation from Sir Robert Ogden, who made his fortune developing London’s docklands and the industrial heartlands of the North, and is one of the country’s leading racehorse owners.

Sir Robert, who was knighted for his services to charity in Yorkshire, follows in a long line of great philanthropists in the region and has helped establish an autistic school in Barnsley and a similar Macmillan Cancer Research centre at St James’s Hospital in Leeds in 2000.

The Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust (HDFT) and Macmillan Cancer Support, have also pledged £2m and £3.5m.

Both the plans for the new unit, as well as an extension to the hospital’s existing car park to make up for a projected shortfall in 150 spaces if the proposals go ahead, have been recommended for approval by council officers.

The chief executive of HDFT, Richard Ord, said: “In these challenging financial times for the NHS we would not be able to do this without the amazing generosity of Sir Robert Ogden and Macmillan Cancer Support and we are extremely grateful for their involvement.

“We want to offer cancer patients across Yorkshire the very best we possibly can and this new unit will make that possible.”

Macmillan Cancer Support director Maureen Rutter, said: “Macmillan is delighted to be working in partnership with HDFT to build what I hope will prove to be an iconic oncology centre, where local people will experience the very best in cancer care and support. We are particularly pleased that Sir Robert Ogden, with whom Macmillan has a very longstanding relationship, has agreed to make an incredibly generous donation towards this project.”