‘Positive’ talks held with trust over a new hospital

Health bosses are being urged by campaigners to seize the “golden opportunity” of a new hospital in Canterbury.

It comes following revelations that the East Kent Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has been in contact with two developers who are offering separate proposals to help make it happen.

Simon Wright of Corinthian Land says he has held “positive” talks with trust bosses after setting aside a site off the A2 as part of his company’s 4,000 Mountfield Park scheme.

He said: “We had a meeting with the trust chief executive, Matthew Kershaw, which lasted about 90 minutes and I thought was very positive

“We made a formal offer of the site and we can definitely see a way forward to a new hospital at the new A2 junction, which is the logical place for it to go.

“What we are offering is a considerable headstart down that road but it still all comes down to funding.

“It is very early days in terms of how much can we put into it and build. It’s just the start of the process and we cannot, at this stage, say exactly what we can supply and we will come back to them with more information.”

Mark Quinn of Quinn Estates has already made the offer to build the shell of a new hospital on the existing K&C site in return for housing development land.

He said this week that work was being done to put forward details of the offer.

“We are working with East Kent Hospitals Trust to come back to them with the due diligence they require in order to assess our proposal and its deliverability and constraints,” he said.

A new hospital does not currently form part of the hospitals’ trust “sustainability and transformation plan” which proposes putting all specialities under one roof in east Kent.

The final options for the future roles of region’s hospitals are expected to be put out to public consultation next spring.

But it is feared that could result in the further downgrading of the K&C, which has already lost acute care to the William Harvey at Ashford.

Mr Kershaw has previously said that a new hospital in Canterbury is not an option because there is no funding for it.

But the offers by the developers could be forcing a rethink.

This week he said the validity of any proposal for a new hospital would need to be established through “due diligence” before it could be considered.

But he added: “If the proposals could provide further opportunities for hospital services in east Kent, they would be assessed alongside other potential options by the NHS.”

This week the chairman cam- paign group Concern for Health in East Kent (Chek), Ken Rogers, said: “The patients of east Kent have this golden opportunity to take advantage of a developer’s support to enable the building of a new hospital in east Kent that will end fifteen years of uncertainty.

“It needs hospital bosses, the clinical commissioning groups, the department of health and the politicians to all get behind and push it forward.”

Chek is also calling on the county council’s health and overview committee, which meets on September 20, to put pressure on the trust over the situation at the K&C and establish when acute services will be returned to the hospital.

Concern for Health in East Kent is adamant that if health services are to survive then everyone needs to back the current proposal for the building of a new hospital adjacent to the present K&C hospital.

We have this golden opportunity to take advantage of a developer’s support to enable the building of a new hospital in east Kent that will end 15 years of uncertainty.

It needs the hospital bosses, the clinical commissioning groups, the Department of health, and the politicians to all get behind and push it forward

Chek is preparing information to forward to the KCC Health and Overview Committee that meets on September 20 to enable the committee to challenge the current situation and hopefully will ascertain a date when the acute services that were temporarily removed from the K&C namely stroke, cardiac, and respiratory will be returned.

We also want to challenge the trust over the resent figures over A&E waiting times and how they are going to meet the challenges of this winter, and why they won’t concede that centralising stroke services for example in the K&C would be best for patients, relieve pressure on the other two hospitals, and reduce dramatically ambulance journeys saving money which can be invested in patient care. Ken Rogers chairman of Chek

Simon Wright, from Corinthian Land, had talks with East Kent Hospitals Trust