Responding to the government’s statement on the New Hospital Programme which revealed that the construction of a new hospital at Watford General Hospital is not expected to start until 2032 to 2034, Daisy Cooper MP for St Albans said:
“This is a massive blow to patients and NHS staff in our area. The previous Conservative government promised us, the people of West Hertfordshire, that we would get a new A&E hospital at Watford General and even claimed that it was fully funded. We can now see that those claims were nothing more than lies.
“But now it’s Labour Ministers who have decided to delay the construction date for potentially seven to nine years without even visiting our A&E hospital to see the state of disrepair for themselves.
“The delay raises more questions than answers.
“Watford General Hospital has the land, the planning permission and the backing of clinicians – so the government need to explain why Watford General is near the bottom of the list not the top.
“We also need to know whether the government will provide the money we need to cover the cost of repairs given that the hospital will continue to crumble whilst we wait for the re-build.
“We also urgently need to know what implications this has for the Mount Vernon Cancer Centre as well, which was due to move onto the Watford General Hospital site to deliver vital cancer services, to people in St Albans and across the West Herts area.
“It’s clear that the Conservative’s initial promise from 2019 simply wasn’t worth the paper that it was written on, but today local people will feel incredibly let down with the Labour government’s delays too.
“Our local A&E hospital is shovel-ready and I will keep fighting for the government to give us the green-light much, much sooner.”