Committee Chief holidays whilst patients worry about their future care

We are grateful to one of the BHU Patients Group for assisting with preparing this report on the Surrey County Council Adults & Health Select Committee meeting on 4 September. Report of the Surrey County Council Adults and Health Select Committee Meeting - 4th September 2017 •This Committee has responsibility for the scrutiny of health and social care services in Surrey. It is made up of Councillors, chaired by Councillor Ken Gulati, and it takes reports from officers and interested parties. •Healthwatch Surrey exercised its statutory power to refer the integrated sexual health and HIV service in Surrey to the Committee because of its concern about the lack of consultation with patients. Healthwatch Surrey submitted that more time was required to allow appropriate consultation to take place. •The Blanche Heriot Unit (BHU) Patients Group were allowed to address the Committee. This was done by Stephen Fash, former Chief Executive of Ashford and St Peter's Hospitals NHS Trust, who identified the lack of consultation, the lack of scrutiny of the new service provider, Central and North West London NHS Trust (CNWL), and the lack of adequate preparation for the transition of services from BHU to CNWL. He pointed out that Surrey County Council had extended the BHU contract for six months in March because a safe exit from that contract could not be assured. The situation had not improved since - in fact it was even less safe now to allow BHU to close because of the lack of adequate and accessible replacement services. The BHU Patients campaign was calling on the commissioners and the elected representatives to extend the existing BHU contract for a further six months. •Cliff Bush, co-Chair of the Surrey Coalition for the Disabled also addressed the Committee pointing out that disabled people who attended BHU would find it impossible to access the replacement clinic at Buryfields, Guildford. He also drew on his experience as a School Governor to highlight the risk that young people from North West Surrey, who currently accessed the discreet walk-in service at BHU, would not go to Buryfields, Guildford because of the time it would take to get there and the cost of making the journey. •Prior to the meeting a number of BHU patients had submitted written questions to the Committee. These were tabled with written corporate-speak responses from officers which avoided the issues raised. The questioners were invited to raise a supplementary question each, only to be told when they did that they would receive a further written answer. •It was clear from the discussion that followed that many of the Committee members were in agreement that no proper consultation with BHU patients had occurred to-date. •It was also apparent to Committee members that no detailed preparation for the closure was in place. Neither had any effective scrutiny taken place of CNWL's contract delivery in Surrey since April when they had taken over the community clinic services previously operated by Virgin Care. This was despite a requirement on CNWL to report against a raft of performance indicators, and numerous reports of operational issues with service users unable to make appointments or obtain contraceptive and other services. Officers told the Committee that the CNWL activity data had not been published yet because of a change in coding! •Cliff Bush reiterated that due to the poor transport links to Buryfields, the majority of his members would have physical difficulty attending. Buryfields is not on a bus route and is two miles from Guildford station. The sexual health clinic is on the 3rd floor of the building which is shared with a dental clinic. There is no dedicated parking and just two designated disabled parking bays in the street outside. The building is awkward to get into using wheelchair. •Councillors were wrongly informed by one of their officers that ‘Extensive consultation had taken place’. When pressed by Councillor Fiona White, the officer concerned admitted that this "consultation" had taken place during the tender preparation stage - prior to the decision to cut the service budget by a third and prior to any decision to close the BHU. Out of a possible 50,000 patients in Surrey only 300 replied to a SurveyMonkey online survey. No BHU patients we know of even saw this. This is not consultation! •Somewhat surprisingly, given that they were appearing before Councillors with a scrutiny function, officers including those from CNWL, adopted a similar approach to that used when responding to BHU patients - obfuscation, fudged answers, promises to get back to the questioner in writing. At least Councillor Helyn Clack, Surrey County Council Cabinet Lead for Heath and Wellbeing, who also attended the meeting, had the honesty to admit that it was about saving money. Her hope that CNWL would be able to deliver as good a service, but in a different way, was a classic example of clutching at straws. •Notwithstanding the obvious disquiet among his members the Committee Chair, Ken Gulati, proposed that a task force be set up to review the consultation and implementation process in order to inform future commissioning of services. The Committee also decided to review the operation of the contract in nine months time. This is not an adequate response in view of the real risk to patients' health and future care if BHU closes at the end of September. Mr Gulati's relaxed approach was apparent by the fact that he went on holiday immediately after the meeting and is not due back until the 25th September. This will leave less than two weeks to set up the Task Group, take evidence and act accordingly before the impending closure. Mr Gulati did find time, however, to let slip a dismissive and disrespectful remark about an email that a BHU patient, who had been at the meeting, sent him afterwards. This is now the subject of a formal complaint. •The BHU Patients Group's position remains that the BHU closure should be postponed for six months to allow full and meaningful patient consultation to take place and accessible adequate service provision made for BHU patients and the people of North West Surrey. •We are supported in our demand by local GPs and health care professionals and by the 2,750 people who have signed the Keep Blanche Heriot Unit Open petition.