No support from councillors for ‘blackmail’ NHS merger with Liverpool

No support from councillors for ‘blackmail’ NHS merger with Liverpool.

Local councillors need more information before giving backing to any NHS merger with Lliverpool health services. That’s the verdict of the Sefton MBC Adult Care and Health Scrutiny Committee which met with local health bosses last week to consider proposed merger plans between three Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) that cover the area from Southport to Liverpool.

Councillor Catie Page, Chair of the Committee and her deputy, Councillor Andy Dams asked CCG Chief Executive Fiona Taylor for details of the planned management savings which would occur if the South Sefton and Southport & Formby CCGs were merged with that of Liverpool. These were not yet available, they were told.

Several councillors expressed concern that Liverpool’s greater size would mean that the needs of Liverpool residents would dominate the agenda of any merged organisation. They expressed concern that the Chief Executive of Liverpool Council had apparently given the merger his backing without the idea being subject to pubic scrutiny in the city. This suggested that the arrangement was going to benefit Liverpool in comparison to the other areas.

“I do not feel we have been provided with sufficient information to allow us to support this decision,” said Councillor Dams. “We need something like a business plan, perhaps an outline business plan.”

Southport councillors’ local health spokesperson Councillor Tony Dawson pointed out that the people of Southport were likely to be as concerned about being swallowed up by any NHS merger with South Sefton, let alone with Liverpool.

“There was a reason why the government set up two CCG’s within the Borough of Sefton. These bodies were meant to be sensitive to local needs in their decision making and Southport and Formby have a completely different Health Economy than does the rest of the Borough. We look mostly towards Southport hospital, they look towards Aintree and Liverpool.”

“Any merger which makes central Liverpool the focus of NHS planning, said Cllr Dawson, would put Southport & Formby hospital in particular in jeopardy whenever any proposed reconfiguration of hospital services is suggested.”

“Southport Hospital is completely out on a limb. Grossly-overspent having had a year with no permanent leadership and then faced with further cutbacks. We’ve been made to merge with St Helens for health service providers and now this merger is planned with Liverpool for service purchasers. There is no merger of service planning because there is no proper planning in the NHS any more.”

“The trouble is, we are effectively being blackmailed. If this merger, with it’s professed savings, does not go through, we are told in no uncertain terms that the result will be an imposition of massive cuts in the NHS available to our local community.”

The Committee voted unanimously on a proposal drafted by Chief Executive Margaret Carney that eclared that Sefton MBC did not support the merger at this time but called on the local CCGs to provide councillors with more information detailing the proposals for merger of the three organisations and showing how the required level of savings would be achieved.