Epsom Hospital Update
We won't give up on Epsom Hospital
Local MP Chris Grayling has pledged to continue to fight for the future of Epsom Hospital, following the NHS decision to downgrade Epsom and build a new hospital in Sutton. Thousands of local people have backed the cross-Party campaign to protect the hospital in the past few months.
In his official response to the NHS consultation exercise, Chris Grayling said the NHS had yet to prove it could afford the project, or to explain how it could cope with a reduction of 300 or so beds in the area. That view has been backed by the all-Party Local Authority Scrutiny Committee which represents Surrey, Merton and Sutton.
"If this were a commercial organisation," he said, "the plans would not have got past the first board meeting. I simply don't see how we can afford to spend so much money building a new hospital. To do so means the local NHS taking on a huge mortgage, with repayments that are much more than it has to spend at the moment. It will only be able to pay the bill by cutting other services."
"Nor can anyone explain how we can do without so many beds at a time when all the existing ones are full virtually all of the time."
"For me the battle goes on, to prove that it is better to modernise the existing hospital, rather than build something which is just not affordable."
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