MSP’s Holyrood speech on hospital

Alex Neil called the Monklands Hospital consultation “totally unaccountable and [flying] in the face of local opinion” as he raised the issue at the Scottish Parliament.

The Ai rdrie MSP said of the emergence of Gartcosh’s former steelworks as the top option: “The health board has based its case on facts that are not facts at all; and the lack of involvement of local patients in the scoring is a democratic outrage.

“NHS Lanarkshire says a key aim is to reduce health inequalities, but it has made a recommendation on the new hospital’s location without having undertaken an equalities impact assessment.

“Local people regard the decision as a total stitchup. A few years ago, we had to fight NHS Lanarkshire on shutting our accident and emergency – now we have to fight over its promise that the hospital would be in Monklands.”

On Scottish Government funding, he added that it “needs to ensure its intentions are carried out and that the new hospital is located where evidence takes us, not a place to which vested interests are trying to railroad us.”

Airdrie for Independence has also launched a petition to retain Monklands Hospital in the local area.

It will be delivered to the health board, after more than 170 signatures were gathered during Saturday’s town-centre street stall.

Speaking out Alex Neil