£8 million loss on failed expansion of Colchester Hospital
October 4, 2007 12:00 AM
The cost to the National Health Service of the collapse of proposals for a major expansion of Colchester General Hospital was about £8 million - it was revealed today by local MP Bob Russell.
Mr Russell has been a stern critic of the Government-backed concept of engaging private companies to build public buildings by what is known as a Private Finance Initiative (PFI).
The expansion at Colchester General Hospital would have been £167 million, but when bosses at Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust looked closely at the figures they concluded that the PFI project would not be in the Trust's financial interests. So they cancelled the project - shortly before the building contract was finalised.
The scheme had taken two years to progress in partnership with private companies.
Mr Russell has consistently highlighted the issue and he has now had a letter from Health Minister Mr Ben Bradshaw MP who confirmed that bid costs totalling £7.3 million had been reimbursed to members of the PFI consortium.
In addition, it is believed that around £700,000 was the value which the local Hospital Trust had contributed to the project - bringing to £8 million the total loss to the NHS.
News of the £8 million cost of the aborted hospital expansion scheme comes a week after it was revealed that the NHS had paid a total of £1 million in redundancy payments to the former Chief Executives of the Colchester and Tendring Primary Care Trusts.
Today Liberal Democrat Mr Russell said: "My opposition to the involvement of the private sector in the NHS, through the PFI route which this Government pursues in other areas of the public sector as well, is because it ends up costing the public more and the quality of service is geared by the PFI partners wanting to squeeze as much profit as possible out of the public purse.
"What we have seen with the collapse of the Colchester Hospital expansion PFI is a huge waste of public money, £8 million in total, which should and could have been put to better use in providing health services for the people of Colchester."
He added: "Cuts by the Primary Care Trust have affected many charitable and voluntary groups who provide a vital role in Health provision. Some of the £9 million squandered by Government-inspired botched behaviour in Colchester's NHS would have meant that these cuts could have been avoided."
What would you like to do next?
-
Subscribe for updates
Follow the party's activity on...
- Twitter:
- Liberal Democrats
- Facebook:
- Liberal Democrats
- YouTube:
- Liberal Democrats