A row has broken out over a proposed funding deal for the rebuilding of Watford General Hospital.
At last week’s Watford Borough Council meeting (Tuesday, 15 October), councillors voted to call on the government to “prioritise and proceed” with plans for rebuilding the hospital.
It comes after the Labour government said it is reviewing the new hospital’s programme, which includes Watford’s hospital, with a decision expected to be announced when Chancellor Rachel Reeves delivers her first budget later this month.
But a heated council debate saw current Labour MP for Watford, Cllr Matt Turmaine (Holywell), say that his Conservative predecessor, Dean Russell, had made “untrue” claims that “the money was all there and allocated”.
After the general election, Mr Russell said he had secured “real funding” of £1.2bn for the hospital.
Mr Turmaine said: “Dean was quoting his £1.2bn, yet Gagan Mohindra [Conservative MP for South West Herts] … got up [in the House of Commons] and said it was only £400m.
“They are not clear on what the financial commitment is, nor indeed the status and availability of that money.
“Let’s make no mistake about who is responsible for the funding gap and, therefore, the delay in this hospital programme – it’s the last Conservative government.
“There was a massive black hole at the heart of the nation’s finances that has got to be dealt with, and that is the reason that the new hospitals programme has been put into review.”
But Liberal Democrat councillors accused Labour of going against pledges they made during the general election campaign, and said the new government had made a choice to review the funding.
In 2020, the Conservative government announced it would spend £400m rebuilding Watford General Hospital and other hospitals run by West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.
Before the election, Matt Turmaine and health secretary Wes Streeting promised that the Labour government would rebuild the hospital.
Mayor Peter Taylor said: “Gordon Brown’s golden rule was borrow to invest. If the current Labour government followed Gordon Brown’s approach, they could borrow to invest in Watford General.“But Labour have chosen not to do it. It’s your party’s decision which has then led to this review which has led to this delay.
“We had years and years and years of Cllr Turmaine coming here and lecturing us about the decisions the coalition made and how terrible it was and how we should be feeling really guilty.
“He’s now a member of a government that’s making decisions that are delaying investment in health.
“We all know the longer the delay is, the more costs will go up, the more patients will suffer, the more staff will have to work in inadequate conditions.”
Cllr Turmaine’s suggestion that Labour had been faced with a “black hole” in the UK’s finance was described by Cllr Ian Stotesbury (LD, Callowland) as a “ridiculous farce”.
He asked: “Are you suggesting that going into the election campaign, when you made these explicit commitments to these residents … you’re telling us that the incoming Labour government was surprised when it found out that the governments of Liz Truss and Boris Johnson had left a financial black hole?”
Earlier in the meeting, Cllr Asif Khan had said: “The previous government’s new hospitals programme made promises and failed to deliver on it, leaving us and other communities high and dry.
“They left a gap in both infrastructure and in trust. Promising something so vital without ensuring funding was not just negligent, it was a betrayal of the public’s confidence.”
Cllr Turmaine said he is meeting with both the NHS Trust and the department of health and social care “on a very regular basis”.
He added that his “election pledge remains in place” and that the review of the new hospitals programme “doesn’t mean that Watford hospital is not going to be built”.
Covering Hertfordshire’s district and borough councils.
