THE battle to save Lewisham Hospital’s A&E and maternity units reaches the High Court today (July 2) as two separate three day hearings begin.
Both challenge the decision of Secretary of State for Health Jeremy Hunt to push ahead with the downgrade of maternity and accident and emergency services at Lewisham Hospital following recommendations by the Trust Special Administrator for the neighbouring South London Hospitals Trust.
The Mayor of Lewisham Sir Steve Bullock said: “These plans have been roundly rejected by local people, by the staff who work in the hospital and by local GPs.
"Our case is simple: neither the Secretary of State nor the TSA had the statutory powers to make major changes to Lewisham Hospital in this way. We will be making this case very strongly in the court.”
The grounds of the Council’s case state: “Both decisions are ultra vires. The TSA was appointed to South London Healthcare Trust only.
"He was not appointed to Lewisham Healthcare NHS Trust.
"The Unsustainable Provider Regime (UPR) confers powers on a TSA and on the Secretary of State respectively to make recommendations, and to take action, about the NHS Trust to which the TSA has been appointed. But they are limited to that NHS Trust.
"The UPR confers no powers either on the TSA to make recommendations or on the Secretary of State to take action about, an NHS Trust, such as Lewisham Healthcare, to which a TSA has not been appointed.”
And lawyers from Leigh Day, on behalf of the Save Lewisham Hospital (SLH) Campaign, will argue the decision to substantially cut some of the hospital’s services in three years’ time is unlawful and they will ask the courts to quash it and ask the secretary of state to reconsider.
In a report published yesterday, Professor Allyson Pollock, professor of public health research and policy at Queen Mary, University of London, claims the full extent and damaging impact of NHS PFI contracts, with consequent debts leading to widespread cuts and closures, threatens to engulf the trust including Lewisham Hospital.
The report claims the major closures, redundancies, sell-offs and service reconfigurations imposed on the hospital, and more widely across the South London Healthcare NHS Trust by the special administrator appointed by the secretary of state, do not serve patient interests whose needs, Prof Pollack claims “…have been, at best, down-played and at worst ignored.”
The report concludes Lewisham Hospital is a thriving local hospital which serves the needs of its local community and that “The TSA has made no public health case for down grading services and provided no sound evidence for the policy.”
The administrator proposed Lewisham Hospitals’ A&E department and all acute admitting wards should close, its adult intensive care unit should close and its maternity service should be downgraded or closed completely.
Save Lewisham Hospital campaign argues the hospital is a busy, well performing and popular hospital and the alternatives being put forward by the secretary of state instead will be extremely difficult for residents to access.
They also point to serious consequences for women who need to access emergency services during labour.
Under the proposals Lewisham Hospital would provide a midwife unit but no obstetric unit.
Should women require emergency services during labour they would have to be transferred by ambulance, mid-crisis to another maternity unit, which raises real risks as to their safety and that of their babies.
The Save Lewisham Hospital campaign group held a commission of inquiry on Saturday to examine the government plans to downgrade and potentially close Lewisham Hospital.
In front of an audience at the Broadway Theatre in Catford, the panel heard evidence from 25 witnesses – patients, patient group representatives, GPs, hospital consultants and nurses.
It was headed by barrister Michael Mansfield who will produce a report over the summer.
Summing up to the commission he said: “The first concern is the absence of democracy. The democratic element as you’ve heard today was removed effectively … Another concern … is that when a reasoned argument was put to the TSA on various occasions we had more than one witness saying effectively they were dismissed.”
The hearings at the Royal Courts of Justice start this morning.
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