A crowd of 120 residents came to a special meeting of Spelthorne Council’s Performance Management and Review Committee to question proposals for a GP-led health facility at Ashford Hospital.
The meeting, which was held at St David’s School, Ashford on 24 September received a presentation from the Surrey Primary Care Trust who also answered a series of questions submitted by the public and councillors. These included concerns about the impact of the proposed new facility on other health services in the area and how it would work in practice. The GP-led Health Centre at Ashford Hospital could be up and running by April 2009.
The Primary Care Trust explained that the new service would run alongside existing services and confirmed its commitment to the new high quality Health Centre to be built on the site of the former Stanwell Day Centre. This building will also contain a library, coffee shop and children’s centre as well as other PCT services.
Cllr Vivienne Leighton, Portfolio Holder for Health and Independent Living said: “The PCT answered detailed questions submitted by the large numbers of people who attended as well as Borough councillors. The meeting provided a forum for people to express concerns, issues and anxieties. As a result of this meeting, there is more clarity about what is proposed and that the intention is to complement existing health services in the Borough”.
Cllr Philippa Broom, Chairman of the Performance Management and Review Committee commented: “Our primary concern is to support the provision of health services for our local community. As a scrutiny committee we will be watching developments closely to see that the PCT fulfil our expectations. From what we learned at the meeting, it is now clear that the GP-led service will be paid for with ‘new’ money (not money taken away from other health services); there will be no adverse effect on existing excellent health provision and that our blueprint new centre at Stanwell will go ahead as planned. Therefore we are able to support the proposal. I would like to thank all those who spent their time coming to the meeting and I hope they were reassured by what they heard and that the opportunity to submit questions was helpful.”
