Kirklees Council Extraordinary Meeting - Wednesday 16th March - All Party Motion on Huddersfield Royal Infirmary Proposal

This Council is totally opposed to the current proposals for future health provision in Kirklees.

Therefore, through this motion, the Council aims to address the health requirements of its residents and proposes to:

1. Establish a cross party working group to develop the right plan for the whole of Kirklees.  The right plan for Kirklees brings together all elements of the system to maximise the health and wellbeing of local residents and provide timely access to treatment, when needed, as locally as possible. 

2. That the plan will focus on prevention, helping people to manage their own health, supporting primary care and general practice to improve local access, changing the way in which hospital staff deliver care by embracing technology and working in the community and making sure that the full range of responses, from Community First Responders to major trauma care, are available when people experience a medical emergency.

3. Call upon local healthcare organisations and national government to support the development and implementation of such a plan, along with appropriate levels of funding to deliver this Plan.”

The Council believes it also important to recognise a number of significant factors:

This Council is very appreciative of the work of the wide range of local healthcare staff and organisations who serve our local population by directly providing care and treatment or undertaking the many related support roles.  These are based in a much wider range of organisations than just the local hospital trusts and span local community pharmacies and general practice through to Yorkshire Ambulance Service. 

This Council also appreciates the work of the members of the Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committees who are involved in reviewing changes to local hospital services and understands the need for them to step back from this debate in order to maintain their independence.

This Council recognises that the NHS both locally and nationally faces real challenges including rising demand, workforce shortages and financial constraints.  The same challenges apply to this Council and are seen in a number of services including, in the context of this debate, adult social care.

This Council realises that change is needed to meet these challenges and does not object to change, when the change is the right change.  The changes that are proposed for hospital services in Huddersfield and Dewsbury are the wrong changes.  They are wrong because they are isolated plans for individual NHS organisations, not plans for the place of Kirklees and its people or plans that take account of health provision in adjacent areas.  This Council cannot support the wrong changes.

Nationally, the NHS itself has recognised that the time has come to plan for a place, not plan for individual organisations and NHS organisations are directed to do this.

The right plan for Kirklees will be about change across the whole system not just about change in individual organisations.  The right plan for Kirklees will be focused on doing the right things for local people, not on what is right for individual organisations.  There is no such plan for Kirklees at present and this Council believes that one is required.