Brooks asks PM for community hospital assurance

Brooks Newmark met today with the Prime Minister to discuss progress on Braintree's long awaited Community Hospital. Brooks Newmark met today with the Prime Minister to discuss progress onBraintree's long awaited Community Hospital. The Prime Minister agreedto a meeting after Brooks challenged him in the House of Commons on thecontinuing delays affecting the project.

After the meeting Brooks said, "Although I am glad that the PrimeMinister recognised the importance of this issue to my constituents byagreeing to meet with me, he was unable to tell me anything that we havenot heard many times before. This is yet another example of warm wordswhich will be of cold comfort to local people."

The Prime Minister attributed the delay in starting work on the projectto ongoing consultation work which is necessary to establish exactlywhich services will be provided at the new facility.

Brooks said, "As I told the Prime Minister, there used to be threecommunity hospitals serving the people of Braintree and now there arenone. Officials have been consulting, and promising, for several yearsbut the same issues are cropping up time and again. I appreciate thatthe Primary Care Trust needs to get the services right but local peopledeserve good local healthcare services now, not months or years furtherdown the line.

I also remain concerned that the proceeds of the sale of the St.Michael's site have been allocated to this project for several years butremain unused. I will continue to fight to see that local people benefitdirectly from the money raised by the sale of the old site.