Monday 24 February 2020

Tory cuts to councils making local patients’ groups ‘unviable’, health secretary warned

Tory cuts to councils making local patients’ groups ‘unviable’, health secretary warned Cuts to council budgets are making watchdog organisations for local patients “unviable”, the health secretary has been warned.

In a letter seen by The Independent, Sir Robert Francis QC, chair of Healthwatch England, said that funding to dozens of its branches, which are statutory bodies set up to champion patient interests locally, has been cut by 37 per cent since 2013.

Sir Robert, who chaired the public inquiry into the Stafford Hospital care scandal, told Matt Hancock that the cuts risked “stifling” the voices of patients across the country.

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