Campaign to save Weavers Croft continues: please write to Patricia Hewitt

It is great news that Stroud Maternity and Cheltenham Maternity will continue to provide their excellent maternity services. A huge thank you to all those who worked so hard work, campaigning, marching, writing letters and so much more.

However many of us are still deeply unhappy about the proposed changes to the older peoples inpatient services for the mentally ill. We need your support locally regarding Weavers Croft.

The Gloucestershire Partnership Trust propose to transfer the inpatient services at Weavers Croft (Stroud), Colliers Court (Cinderford) and Holly House (Gloucester) to a single site at Charlton Lane (Cheltenham).

The Overview and Scrutiny Committee, after in-depth discussions with the Partnership Trust, have decided to refer this proposal to the Secretary of State for Health. The OSC have published the reasons why they have done this on the Gloucestershire County Council website.

The Overview and Scrutiny Committee believe that the proposal to centralise the older people's mental health inpatient services will have a detrimental effect on the health and experience of the local residents due to:

- The significant negative impact that the proposal will have in terms of access
- The reductions in community staffing levels in the same localities that are losing
locally based inpatient services
- The negative medium term impact associated with undertaking major refurbishment
work at Charlton Lane whilst the centre is occupied

David Miller, Chairman of Save Stroud Hospitals Taskforce has written to all Town and Parish Councils saying:

"Reflecting the views of local residents we agree with the OSC appraisal. We believe that one of the most fundamental needs of an older person with a mental illness is the need to be in contact with familiar people, situations and places to reduce anxiety and increase the sense of wellbeing. To transfer the care of these older people away from their communities would be fundamentally wrong.

"The centralising of these services also goes against Government policy outlined in the White Paper "Our Health, Our Care, Our Say" published in January 2006, which has the clear vision of locating services within local communities and engaging with the people of those communities to ascertain their needs and wishes. We are writing to you to request that you consider supporting the retention of the Weavers Croft inpatient services for older people with a mental illness by writing to: The Rt. Hon. Patricia Hewitt MP, The Secretary of State for Health, Richmond House, 79, Whitehall, London, SW1A 2NS.

"We believe that she is concerned about this issue and will listen to the sincere observations of our community."

David Miller also asks that individuals write to the Secretary of State about this important service. We can still save our local services - please flood Patricia Hewitt with letters. My Blog from 14th July may also provide some useful info.