THE GOVERNMENT’S failure to mention the Ellen Badger Hospital in its ten-year NHS plan has been branded a “missed opportunity” by Stratford MP Manuela Perteghella.
She said the plan, announced on July 3, should have been a chance to rebuild local health services after years of neglect under the previous Conservative government.
Dr Perteghella particularly criticised the plan’s failure to include any mention of restoring services at the Ellen Badger Hospital in Shipston – a long-running concern for residents in the south of the constituency.
The Liberal Democrat MP has campaigned for the full use of the newly rebuilt Ellen Badger Hospital, with a focus on delivering a range of community health services from the site, including restoring inpatient beds, which has been ruled out by the ICB.
Dr Perteghella has called on the government to commit to investing in the Ellen Badger site and to accelerate its long-overdue review of social care, currently expected to take three years.
She said: “The 10-year NHS Plan was a missed opportunity to break with the years of Conservative neglect that pushed our NHS to breaking point. Social care was barely an afterthought and the future of Ellen Badger Hospital has been completely ignored.
“The failure to include Shipston’s Ellen Badger in the Government’s vision for the next decade is yet another sign that rural health services are being overlooked. This new facility must not be left standing as hospital in name only – it needs to be delivering care for local people.
“I will continue to push ministers every step of the way until they deliver on Ellen Badger and fix the crisis in social care. Only then will we see the meaningful change that people in Stratford-on-Avon are crying out for and that can rebuild our local health services.”
