Cuts to Medway public health budget totalling over £1 million nation announced

For Medway this could mean a cut to its public health budget of around £1,042,000.

Having a keen interest in health issues, with a 21 year career in pharmacy and being a volunteer medic, and a Governor for the South East Coast Ambulance Service, Paul Chaplin was concerned when he heard about these cuts

Question to Council

At the last full council meeting on 12th August 2015, Paul asked a public question to the portfolio holder for Adult Services, Cllr David Brake. The question was as follows:

''The Government announced cuts of £200 million to the public health budget for local authorities. How much has Medway's budget been cut, and what services will be stopped or reduced to meet this deficit?''

Paul has received a response from Cllr Brake as follows:

On the 4th of June the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a year in cut to the public health grant given to local authorities totalling £200m nationally.

On 31st July, the Department of Health launched a consultation with local authorities on how the cuts should be implemented. The main question relates to how each local authorities' contribution to the saving will be made. The consultation proposes a range of options with the Department of Health favouring the option to apply a rate of 6.2% to all local authorities.

The consultation runs until 28th August and if the flat rate of 6.2% is subsequently announced this would mean a cut of £1,042,000 for Medway.

Cllr Brake stated that the Public Health Grant is used to provide and commission a range of public health services which improve and protect the health of local people, He said the council was currently reviewing how best to implement this in year cut to the grant whilst minimising the impact on health.

Paul then asked a supplementary question to Cllr Brake:

''The Government want to cut the £2.8 billion earmarked for Public Health earmarked for local authorities of around 7%. Can the portfolio holder tell us how he intends to protect essential preventative frontline services such as smoking cessation, alcoholism, obesity, sexual and mental health to ensure the people of Medway do not see these services suffer needlessly and as a further assurance can he confirm that there will be no increase in council tax to compensate for these short sighted cuts''

Cllr Brake declined to answer Paul's supplementary question on the basis he that he considered he had answered the supplementary in the last part of his response to the initial question

He added that the Public Health Grant was used to provide and commission a range of public health services, many of which the public questioner had outlined, to improve and protect the health of local people. The council was currently reviewing how best to implement this in year cut to the grant whilst minimising the impact on health.

He stated it was too early at this stage to give an indication as to where any revision in service is likely to be.

This response does not give any real answer and no assurances.

What is clear that the Public Health Budget will be cut somewhere and where ever those cuts fall are likely to be to those people who need the services the most, as is always the case with Tory cuts.

Paul will keep an eye on this and will continue to press the council for a proper detailed reply outlining where their proposed cuts are likely to fall.

It is a contradiction that the council are considering spending £984,000 on building a new car park in Rochester, yet are not prepared to use this money to safeguard essential preventative services by using it instead to fill the £1,042,000 cut to the public health budget, which will benefit the people of Medway as whole and not just Rochester, which has had more than it's fair share of public money recently, including £27 million on a new train station. Pity the council didn't get the developers to fund the car park at the same time!