February 20 in blog
The Government has finally come forward with concrete proposals for improving children’s palliative care services – some nine years after I started campaigning to improve them.
It would be excessively curmudgeonly of me not to say that it is good the Government has begun to tackle the issue. But looking at the document, it concentrates excessively on what the statutory sector can do – and there is not much mention of what the network of children’s hospices can do.
There is £20 million of emergency funding to help children’s hospices out until 2011. But this is less than the £27 million emergency funding announced in May 2006 to last until now. And that money sounds a lot less when it is spread around – it amounted to only £185,000 for Brian House here in Blackpool.
There is meant to be more money going to Primary Care Trusts – but it is not being ringfenced, and given the pressure on PCT budgets, I am not convinced that money will be there. I am utterly convinced that where children’s hospices are providing services which should or would otherwise be provided by the NHS, the PCT should recompense them. This does not happen yet.
So better than nothing … but still more questions than answers.
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