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MP vows to fight plans for QEII cuts

PRESS RELEASE
Immediate Release: Saturday, 29 October 2005

WELWYN HATFIELD MP Grant Shapps has labelled the proposed cuts to services at the QEII "outrageous" and has vowed to fight them.

Speaking after East and North Herts NHS Trust bosses visited MPs at Westminster to discuss the cuts, which include the proposed closure of the QE2 A&E, the closure of Maternity and the cutting of many other vital services, Mr Shapps said the proposals would be a "complete disaster for Welwyn Hatfield."

He said: "I'm absolutely appalled by these proposals. I think it is a complete disaster for healthcare in Welwyn Hatfield and in fact a betrayal of everything that's been proposed over the years, right back to when the trust merged with the Lister.

"We're in a situation where our local health service is being dismantled. We are supposed to put our faith in a new hospital being opened somewhere down the line, but what if it doesn't happen?”

At Monday's press briefing on the changes, chief executive Nick Carver said the trust was not creating a primary and secondary hospital. He said: "We are not running down one and building up the other, we are using the same capacity in a different way."

But Mr Shapps said he would be vigorously campaigning against the proposals and mobilising the local community to get behind a campaign to stop the closures which also incorporate the remaining daytime children's A&E service.

The local MP is setting up a Save The QE2 website, requesting an urgent debate in Parliament, has tabled a Written Question to the Secretary of State for Health and is forming an action group to fight the closure with the intention of rallying the community against the closures with demonstrations and marches to follow.

ENDS
More info:
Grant Shapps on 07968 070097