The City Council’s response to the Coventry Area Health Authority’s list of 20 outstanding issues that must be resolved before a decision can be made on the siting of Coventry’s new hospital, has been submitted today.

The Coventry Area health Authority has re-iterated that its preference is for city centre-sited new hospital if it can be made to work.

The detailed work relating to the Coventry and Warwickshire site has shown that a city centre site:

• Can work,

• Can be delivered within the timescale, cost and process that meets the Government’s PFI process,

• Is likely to be cheaper to NHS revenue funds and the users of the new hospital over its economic life than the Walsgrave option,

• Meets all Central Government objectives in terms of strategic planning, access to health facilities, "green travel" and regeneration,

• Will bring enormous additional economic benefit to the city and sub-region over and above the Walsgrave proposals, and

• Is supported by large majority of the people of Coventry for whom it is predominantly built to serve.

Councillor John Flecther, Leader of the City Council says:

"Working with colleagues from the Area Health Authority and with the benefit of objective, external advice, we can now prove what we always believed, and that is that the city centre scheme is do-able, fundable and deliverable.

"The people of Coventry want a city centre sited hospital to best serve them, their children and their grandchildren for perhaps the next 50 years. All of Central Government policies and pronouncements about "Joined-Up Government" to best meet people’s needs can be delivered in a very tangible way here in Coventry with a new city centre-based hospital.

"The Coventry and Warwickshire proposal will act as a major statement about our future. If this Government is really to deliver its commitment to Urban Regeneration and quality of Life, then we must stop building hospitals far away from where they are most needed.

"Any challenge to the city centre scheme must now prove to the people of Coventry why it can’t work, as it meets all Government policies and will be a beacon to later decisions about new hospital locations across the country."