An open letter to Hertfordshire MPs and NHS Improvement CEO Ian Dalton:

Back in 2013 Samantha Jones, the then CEO of West Herts Hospitals Trust, said many of Watford General Hospital’s buildings were not fit for purpose.

2018 - The NHS regulator, NHS Improvement, has asked the hospitals trust to come up with a more affordable and more phased redevelopment programme than had been submitted by the trust in their strategic outline case for Watford General Hospital. To add to this, campaigners call for a new and more central A&E hospital for West Herts has been met by concerns from the hospitals trust and NHS Improvement that any move to relocate A&E facilities to a more central and accessible location in West Herts could destabilise hospitals located outside West Herts - who are they kidding? This would certainly not be the case - residents in Watford are not going to go to hospitals nearer to London when they would have a brand new state of the art hospital on their doorstep. A brand new and more central West Herts A&E Hospital will serve everyone living in West Herts rather than is the case at the moment where many of those living in St Albans, Harpenden and Hemel Hempstead prefer to avoid Watford General Hospital at all costs and use hospitals like The Lister and The Luton and Dunstable. I cannot speak for those living in Watford but haven’t met anyone from St Albans, Harpenden and Hemel Hempstead who thinks Watford General Hospital is in a good state, is easy to get to or is worth ploughing millions into when a new A&E hospital for West Herts could transform the hospital facilities in west Herts.

It is extremely risky to be undertaking extensive refurbishment on old and dilapidated hospital buildings when the small and self-contained Vicarage Road site is surrounded by residential buildings including a Premier League football ground. To add to this the site suffers from being situated on a massive gradient and does not have good public transport links. West Herts Hospitals Trust’s redevelopment plans are a recipe for making patients and hospital staff lives hell with all the noise, dust, demolition and construction going on for many years.

How can the trust expect to attract and retain the best staff when Vicarage Road is going to be a building site for more than a decade?

NHS Improvement, the hospitals trust and Herts Valleys Clinical Commissioning Group need to remember that WHHT does not stand for Watford Hospital Heritage Trust, but the trust serves everyone living in West Herts (look at the map - Watford General Hospital is on the outskirts of West Herts). I seriously beginning to wonder who is pulling the strings on the trust’s redevelopment plans. Professor Barnett, the trust’s chairman, said the trust’s redevelopment plans were ambitious - surely the request for them to be more affordable dampens down these boasts.

A new A&E hospital could be up and running in seven years, without patient disruption and provide a better long-term acute care service solution both for the current population of West Herts and the 150,000 that will be joining us in the next 15 years!

West Herts should not be second best when competing for funds with hospitals like The Princess Alexander in Harlow.

Please, no talk about a new planned surgery hospital to replace St Albans and Hemel Hempstead hospitals. A new A&E hospital is the only logical answer to correct the lack of investment in West Herts’ hospitals over many years, during which the population has continued to soar. To think that West Herts had three A&E hospitals with a much smaller population and we are now left with a dilapidated A&E hospital on the site of an old Victorian workhouse!

HS2 will cost billions and save 20 minutes on the journey time from London to Birmingham.

A new and more central A&E hospital for West Herts could also save 20 minutes on journey times, but more importantly, for those travelling in a blue light ambulance!

Andy Love

St Albans