Surprise setback as health group’ s appeal turned down

Brechin campaigners received a surprise setback on their six-year journey to turn the town’s former infirmary into a community health hub.

The Scottish Government rejected the appeal by Brechin Healthcare Group (BHG) against a Tayside Health Board refusal of a Community Asset Transfer (CAT) of the site.

The group provides a range of valuable local services from the Jenner Centre in the heart of the town, but the charity’s ambition was to create a community hub offering a range of health and wellbeing services and activities.

Their plans include a global garden, training programmes and a range of opportunities around social prescribing.

BHG chairman Grahame Lockhart said the pandemic had highlighted the need for a facility like the one they hoped to create.

“We are bitterly disappointed,” he said.

“We have funders waiting in the wings, and they are very enthusiastic about the project.

“But we can’t get that funding until we actually have the building.”

NHS Tayside declared the 153-year-old infirmary surplus to requirements in 2018.

By that time BHG had already been in existence for three years following concerns over local healthcare provision.

BHG developed a business case and made a £150,000 CAT application to NHS Tayside.

But it was rejected last summer.

The health authority had concerns about the deliverability and sustainability of the project.

And it believed the group’s offer was well below the three-and-a-half acre site’s value.

NHS Tayside Board say the infirmary is worth £400,000 as it stands, or £675,000 as a clear development site.

The group appealed the matter to Scottish Ministers under the 2015 Community Empowerment Act.

Case reporter Paul Cockette sided with BHG on the size of their offer.

He said: “The community elements comprise, in my view, benefits which are proportionate to the value of the property and level of discount sought.”

But the reporter said there were too many unanswered funding questions.

“It appears to me that the appellants are heavily reliant on uncertain funding streams

materialising or the goodwill of others.

“And, especially in the early years, on their hope that no significant deterioration occurs or no further essential maintenance needs arise.”

He said BHG had failed to show the “viability,

sustainability and funding for their proposals in order to meet the requirements of the statutory framework for a community asset transfer”.

Mr Lockhart said: “After spending six years on this, we are now in a very difficult situation.

“We have the Jenner Centre in the former Santander Bank premises in Brechin. And while it is doing amazing stuff, it is just not suitable for the long term.

“We had looked at other sites in Brechin for the health and wellbeing hub.

“But none offered the accommodation and space to deliver the wide range of services and opportunities of the infirmary site.

“Those opportunities included employment, work experience and therapeutic horticulture for those struggling with mental health issues.

“The Jenner Centre will continue.

“But as we only have a short lease on the premises, we need to consider its future.

“We will be meeting as a group to consider what we do next and the options for the future.”

Brechin Healthcare Group chairman Grahame Lockhart.