Hancock quietly made a major U-turn at health questions yesterday

After seven years and hundreds of millions of pounds wasted, the Secretary of State for Health admitted – in response to a planted question at Health Questions in parliament yesterday – that the government has abandoned plans to demolish two major hospitals, Charing Cross and Ealing in West London. In a brief aside yesterday, Matt Hancock binned the biggest reconfiguration of services in the history of the NHS.

Announcing a U-turn on ‘Shaping a Healthier Future’, described as the largest hospital closure programme in NHS history by campaigners, Hancock said: “Shaping a healthier future is no longer supported by the Department of Health and Social Care… as for the changes in A&E in west London… for instance those at Charing Cross Hospital…these will not happen.”

The NHS, locally and in London, had not been told about the announcement but later confirmed in a statement: “We will not be taking forward the plans as set out in Shaping a Healthier Future for changes to Ealing and Charing Cross Hospitals.”

Shaping a Healthier Future was approved over six years ago and despite huge opposition from residents, clinicians, Hammersmith and Fulham Council and Ealing Council has remained government policy until this week. It would have seen the full demolition of the hospitals, the closure of A&E services and the loss of 1,000 inpatient beds across north-west London. Parts of the sites were to be sold for commercial development and primary care services installed on the remaining land.

After the closure of A&E departments at Hammersmith and Central Middlesex Hospitals in 2014, waiting times grew to some of the longest in the country. It was clear that the closure plans were both politically toxic and unfeasible in the light of growing demand. The final nail was the cash crisis in the NHS. A bid for £260m to redevelop the Ealing site was refused in December 2018, with only £10m granted.

By slipping out the climb down in response to a planted question from a Tory MP, the government not only insulted the local NHS but put forward no plans for clearing up the mess they have made. Last month The Times revealed a £600m backlog in maintenance at Imperial Healthcare Trust’s three hospitals, Charing Cross, Hammersmith and St Mary’s alone. No funding has been made available to meet this gap.

My first reaction on hearing the news was this: “Charing Cross Hospital is a world-class hospital at the heart of our community. Its brilliant staff have lived for nearly seven years with the threat of closure, while hundreds of millions were wasted on management consultants dreaming up schemes that were bound to fail. The defeat of these demolition plans is a great victory for our local community, supported by Labour councils in Hammersmith & Fulham and Ealing and by the Save our Hospitals campaign.

“We will start by celebrating the survival of a great hospital, but quickly move back to campaign mode. The government no longer has the fig-leaf of Shaping a Healthier Future to hide behind. They must come up with the fund for both our neglected hospitals and underfunded primary care services.”

Now the nightmare is over, it is difficult to believe that back in 2012 we faced a hostile coalition of central government, the Mayor and local council, all then Tory-controlled. I will never forgive the Conservatives in Hammersmith for supporting the demolition of Charing Cross.

The new battle we have to fight is for NHS funding. Our local NHS, already reducing GP out-of-hours services to save around £30m, has another £10m bill this year to pay for the private ‘GP at Hand’ service, which is preying on GP services here with the active support of the Secretary of State. But today, two million people across west London are breathing a sigh of relief that the futures of our hospitals are secure.