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Cash stash in demand
• THE recent article (Found: £2.4m ‘stash’ that could save health centre, November 13) was misleading. The funding budget for the 10-year EC1 New Deal for Communities (NDC) programme has not changed since it was first set up and it is quite wrong for the article to suggest new money has been found.
Our board, which is made up of residents and local service providers, has been discussing in great depth how to invest the remaining funds to benefit local people. The £2.4million referred to will have to be spent in the coming year and there are a number of well-developed competing projects to consider, ranging from improvements to community facilities and schemes to improve the streets, parks and estates in EC1.
The recommendation that all or some of this money be used to try to secure the future of Finsbury Health Centre is a potentially worthwhile idea. NHS Islington has membership on our board and we have worked together on many health projects. Your readers should be under no illusion though that £2.4million of NDC funding is sufficient to secure the future of the centre. There will be many challenges in developing such a project, not least timing. There are also many other calls on this money that need to be considered.
We have until February next year to decide how the funding will be invested, which is when we submit our final-year delivery plan to central government. Your readers can stay informed through our website www.yourec1.com and magazine Your EC1.
Matthew Humphreys
Chair, EC1 NDC Board
• LEO Chapman’s letter about the membership of the Primary Care Trust board (and their accountability in supporting the proposed closure of Finsbury Health Centre) was pertinent, but fell slightly short of what I feel is the real underlying issue (Philistine sale of icon, October 23).
The real issue is that under the Lib Dems, all “arms’-length” or “contracted-out” services to the council, be it Homes for Islington, Partners for Improvement, Cambridge Educational Associates, Caterlink, Care UK or the PCT, have either a poor, or very poor level of accountability to local people. The Lib Dems are very happy to use this “distance” to avoid being held responsible or accountable for the quality of those services.
Whether it is the quality of housing repairs, the standard of adult social care, exam results or the determination of the PCT to abandon Finsbury Health Centre, under the Lib Dems local people feel powerless and frustrated by their inability to complain about or improve these services.
As chair of the health and wellbeing scrutiny committee, I have requested that all the NHS facilities serving this area (NHS Islington, Camden and Islington Mental Health Trust, the Whittington and Moorfields) attend the committee, and report on progress and performance standards, in order that a level of accountability is maintained, and that ordinary residents have an opportunity to put questions directly to service providers. I will follow up any questions that are not answered satisfactorily in the meeting. I welcome any members of the public who wish to attend the committee meetings. More than 50 people attended the last meeting on Finsbury Health Centre.
I would stress that I am keen to invite questions from the public to any of the organisations that provide this borough’s health services. Camden and Islington Mental Health Trust will be on December 10, Moorfields on January 7, and NHS Islington (the PCT) on February 1. All meetings are held at the town hall.
Cllr Martin Klute
Labour chairman, health and wellbeing scrutiny committee
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