QC claims Savernake day hospital is not closed (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

QC claims Savernake day hospital is not closed

10:15am Friday 3rd July 2009

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Wiltshire Primary Care Trust has not closed the day hospital at Savernake its QC Philip Havers argued at the ongoing High Court hearing in London.

Mr Havers who is opposing hospital campaigner Val Compton’s applications for the day hospital to be re-opened and a new consultation carried out into the Minor Injuries Unit said: “The day hospital is still there, still in use although most of its services are linked to the neighbourhood team.”

Yesterday (Thursday) he refuted the claims of Mrs Compton’s legal team headed by Neil Garnham QC that the day hospital was closed down.

Mr Havers also rebuffed Mrs Compton’s case that the minor injuries unit had been shut when there were no good clinical reasons for closing it and, she said, the financial case put forward by Wiltshire Primary Trust for closing it was flawed.

Every day at least a dozen people from Marlborough and Hungerford have travelled up to the court to support Mrs Compton including yesterday (Thursday) Mayoress Edwina Fogg.

Mrs Compton thanked her supporters for their long days – catching a coach at 6.30am and not getting back until after 7pm – and said: “We know the judge is impressed by seeing so many people coming up from Wiltshire and Berkshire to support me and be in court with me.”

As the four day hearing drew towards the end of the penultimate day Mr Havers said: “The PCT had a number of sound reasons, clinical, operational and financial and arising out of central government policy, for making its decision to close the MIU at Savernake Hospital within the context of a decision to reconfigure urgent care services across the whole of Wiltshire.”

The PCT, said Mr Havers, had made it clear in its Pathways for Change consultation exercise its reasons for reshuffling urgent care services in the county and that those reasons were likely to lead to the closure of some centres.

The rationale behind the decision to establish two new minor injuries units at Chippenham and Trowbridge was based on population density and activity levels within existing MIU’s.

“The principal aim was to obtain the right balance of MIU provision across Wiltshire so that the needs of the community would be met in a way that was clinically sustainable and a good use of resources,” Mr Havers said.

Among the 2,000 pages of written evidence handed to Mr Justice Ross Cranston, the former Labour MP and professor of law, who is conducting the judicial reviews at the Royal Courts of Justice were statements from PCT chief executive Jeff James saying that the Savernake MIU was under used and that half of the patients seen there had minor illnesses that should have been dealt with by GP’s.

Mr Havers also countered an accusation from Mrs Compton’s lawyers that the Pathways for Change consultation analysis carried out by a Bristol company Red Bridge Solutions could be seen to show bias because one of the company directors Steven Tanner was the domestic partner of Jane Britton, a senior executive within the Avon, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire Strategic Health Authority that controls all the PCT’s in the three counties.

The defence QC contended that all members of the Wiltshire PCT had been made aware of the personal connection between Ms Britton and the company it employed to analyse the consultation results.

However, earlier, Mr Havers had told the judge that Professor Alistair Bellingham who was chairman of the former Kennet and North Wilts PCT that was merged into the Wiltshire PCT had said he was unaware of the connection between Ms Britton and Red Bridge and that it “would have caused him serious concern in view of the potential conflict of interest”.

Today Mr Garnham will give the final summing up.

It is expected that Mr Justice Cranston will not announce his decision today and that he will reserve judgement for several weeks while he considers the hundreds of pages of evidence.

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