A crucial time for one of the main schemes to cut NHS services is now upon us.

From April 2016, NHS Foundation Trusts will be able to to stop providing certain NHS services, that are currently protected. This is due to changes to hospital licenses,  brought in by the hospitals regulator and competition enforcer, Monitor.

At the Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group meeting on 24th September 2015, Plain Speaker asked questions about how these licence changes are going to affect the range of services that Calderdale and Huddersfield hospitals provide.

Particularly: how this will affect Calderdale people’s access to comprehensive, universal healthcare that is free at the point of delivery and based on patients’ clinical needs. Given that it seems that services that are currently mandatory will fall away. Continue reading →