Letter to States Members
When asked where I would like to see our new hospital built, I once uttered the words 'anywhere but Gloucester Street', I am now eating those words.
Whilst I personally have no agenda or particular preference over the location of the site, there are several factors that make the selection extremely important.- and all islanders need to sit up and take note, as it affects us all, particularly in light of the finances of the island following the Covid 19 pandemic (which is not yet over) and the effects of which will continue for some time. The site must be able to:
a. House the hospital we need without any compromise to our health service
b. Support future growth for the next 60 years or so (60 years ago the General Hospital was just the granite block.
c. Deliver the hospital within the timescale (any longer incurs additional cost).
d. Built in the fastest time and at the best possible price
Reading the 35-page report on the site selection process, it is clear that the 'Citizens panel' had very little input and one has to wonder how they were guided through the process. The final Shortlisting panel were all civil servants who apparently totally ignored the Citizens panel criteria; none are from Jersey; and our POG and COM ratified their choices. How can they justify this? Nowhere in the report did the citizens panel express a preference for location by parish, in fact their main 5 drivers were that the site should:
1. Be big enough to accommodate all the required clinical and support services including staff and service access activities.
2. Provide the ability for expansion
3. Be able to deliver the hospital project in the project timeline
4. Have a highway network, locally and strategically which has the capacity to access and serve the hospital
5. Be capable of being well served by public transport
Of the first criteria, People's Park and St Andrew's Park are both listed as 'maybe'. This is not good enough. There would be significant compromises to our health offering if either of these sites were selected. St Andrew's Park also has a Neolithic Dolmen in the middle of it and a church on its eastern side, quite apart from being the only green space in a significantly built up area.
Even more strange is that whoever prepared this table listed St Saviour's Hospital as only 'maybe' big enough when it was the second largest site in the whole process. (As an example, People's Park is listed as 22,784 m² (according to Gleeds actually smaller, at 22,570 m²) , whilst St Saviour's hospital including Clinique Pinel and Rosewood is a whopping 74, 983 m² according to the 2013 Atkins report, not the 51,939 m² listed on the latest report. This clearly needs to be challenged. Who is deliberately altering these numbers? Equally to the point, who is not checking them?
Only three of the shortlisted sites are able to deliver the project within the timescale, yet none of them are on the shortlist. They are:
a. St Saviour's Hospital
b. Warwick Farm
c. The fields at Le Boulivot.
The first two are already in public ownership.
The question about public transport is really irrelevant, as it is easy to run a minibus service to and from the hospital as they do in Southampton. I am sure that with the army of charity workers and minibuses, HSC keeps telling us about, we could probably even provide this as a free service to anyone with an appointment letter.
From the original 82 sites, at least 6 were discounted as not big enough for any option, but were all larger than People's Park.
Warwick Farm was the front runner in the 2013 report the States commissioned from WS Atkins - experts in this field and, as a practically empty site would surely deliver the cheapest and fastest option and needs to be considered. This site is 54,123m² in size according to Atkins, not the 52,041 m² being quoted now. The latest table states that this site could not be well served by public transport but, ironically, states that the fields opposite Rondel's Farm shop, which is practically next door and on the same road, can be. It would therefore appear that our UK recruited civil servants have no knowledge of our island and are working to an agenda.
The guidance planning notes mention the need for an environmental impact assessment on the sites, but makes no mention of a health impact assessment, which should also be produced. Clean, fresh air and sufficient green space are both essential requisites for a hospital. There would certainly be none of that if either of the parks, or the playing fields were selected. Hospitals next to busy roads do not enjoy a noise free environment either.
A report published without notice on the States website on 20th July 2020, titled 'Kit of Parts', shows the size of the hospital footprint required as being 23,243m²and an adjacent site of 17,723m² making a total of 40,966 m², not allowing for any space between the buildings. How does this fit onto People's Park, at 22,570 m², or St Andrew's Park at 36,708 m²? Even though the secondary building would fit onto one of the sites at the Millbrook option, the main building would not.
Even assuming that some of this could be incorporated into a basement, as mentioned in the 'Kit of Parts', where then does car parking go? There is a mention that car parking could be up to 15 minutes away. Does this mean they would utilise Patriotic Street car park if the People's Park option was selected?
Remote car parking was rejected in the Future Hospital scheme, as you cannot expect sick and disabled people to make that journey, especially in cold, slippery and inclement weather, not to mention young mothers with prams and toddlers. This 'Kit of Parts', also does not show a hydrotherapy pool anywhere and we were promised that all the services we currently have would be provided in the new hospital. The promised radiotherapy centre is also missing.
The outline of the People's Park is also interesting as it includes the cliff area behind the grassy patch. Does this mean that this would have to be dug out? Clearly that is not a job for a hand pick. How can they therefore state that there would be no disruption to surrounding properties during construction? It would be massive, especially if they were digging out a basement as well.
The site selection report states that it was produced in accordance with the Jersey Care Model. How can this be? We are still awaiting the PWC report on stress testing and costing the Jersey Care Model which HCS are treating as a 'secret' document. There has been none of the “further consultation” promised by the Director General of HCS, Ms Caroline Landon, in her presentations in the autumn of 2019, nor has it been taken, budgeted and approved by the States Assembly. Yet, this model will apparently establish the detailed design of the new hospital and its campus. Meanwhile, The Chief Minister's report "New Hospital Project: Next Steps" (R.54/2019) published on 3rd May 2019 sets out the approach he required, stating that it would:
a. Establish the agreed relevant clinical requirement of the new hospital
b. Use the outcome of the relevant clinical requirement to scope the size and shape of the new hospital to inform the consideration of potential locations
c. Involve a thorough process of island and stakeholder communication and engagement, alongside technical assessments of deliverability.
d. Identify a shortlist of sites for further consideration to allow a preferred site to be identified
This has not happened either, rather like the “further public consultation”.
The site selection process should have been in accordance with the Treasury Green Book Guidance. If so, the five selected sites should be:
a. Fields at Le Boulivot
b. St Saviour's Hospital
c. Warwick Farm
d. Overdale
e. Fields at Five Oaks
All of these sites would also have plenty of room for expansion and for the provision of staff accommodation.
On a separate note, I have spent some time this afternoon looking at the ‘Public Realm and Movement Strategy for St Helier’.
As more than 60% of the population live outside St Helier, how does it make any sense at all to bring those people into the capital for hospital appointments when the clear objectives of this strategy are to reduce traffic flow in town? The majority of people using the hospital are elderly and they mostly live in the outlying parishes. All of the above sites can be reached from the north, east and west without driving through town and patients living in town could easily jump on the hopper bus.
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