Health chiefs back new £27m Ludlow hospital
A new £27 million hospital in south Shropshire has moved a step closer to reality after county health chiefs backed the plans.
A new £27 million hospital in south Shropshire has moved a step closer to reality after county health chiefs backed the plans.
The board of Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust has given its blessing to proposals to build a health village including a new hospital and two GP surgeries at Ludlow Eco Park on the outskirts of the town.
The final go-ahead is expected to be given by the Strategic Health Authority on Thursday and if approval is granted building work could start this summer.
It has also been revealed that Amber Investments, the private equity company selected by NHS bosses to build the hospital, will be paid about £1.5 million every year for 25 years once the new facility is opened in 2014.
NHS chiefs said the lease payment agreed with Amber for year one is £1,572,000 which will be reassessed each year in line with the Retail Price Index.
If the RPI, used to measure inflation in the economy, rises the yearly lease payment would also increase. Dozens of residents attended the meeting of Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust’s board at Ludlow Mascall Centre yesterday and the decision to back the project has been greeted with delight by campaigners.
Peter Corfield, chairman of Ludlow Hospital League of Friends, said: “What takes place in Ludlow could be used to set a pattern for other towns.”
Councillor Martin Taylor-Smith said: “I’ve been out knocking on doors in the town and it is clear how much people want this hospital.”
Comments for: "Health chiefs back new £27m Ludlow hospital"
Grim Reaper
"A health village"? That's a novel way of describing the proposed new complex, which we will all be paying for for years to come - £1.5 million being paid to Amber Investments each year for the next twenty five years? A figure which will increase if the RPI increases.
I presume Amber Investments isn't a subsidiary of Veolia by any chance? Amber seems to have the NHS Trust by the proverbials, much as Veolia has Shropshire Council over the refuse collection contract. We are being well and truly screwed - on both fronts.
And before we get carried away in the euphoria of this scheme, the only reason the hospital is to be built where it is proposed to be built (and not on the original hospital site) is because the Area Health Authority (or whatever it calls itself these days) has plans for the old site - housing - which it confidently believes will bring in a nice little earner - irrespective of the dire state of the housing market.
Trebles all round then for Amber and Veolia!
uptheprivatesector
Your name suits you well. A brand new hospital and you cry foul. Involvement of the private sector and as with all Guardian readers you cry foul.
Get a life and move away from the blinkered thought that the state has to own and run everything
Edward
Is that wood cladding I see on the front of the hospital. For heavens sake please take notice of the wood cladding on Shrewsbury's Theatre Severn.Use it at your peril. It will look alright for a while then watch it deteriorate and look shabby.
Grim Reaper
So does anything, Edward, if it is not properly maintained - witness the rundown state of many of the county's state school buildings, both primary and secondary. But, so what, let them fall to bits, then blame central government for not providing sufficient funding, and off goes Shropshire Council on another quest for monies to build anew, instead of maintaining its existing school buildings in a fit and proper state of repair. By all means thereafter seek funding for alterations and extensions, even building new facilities, but look after what is there first.