HC Deb 30 April 1974 vol 872 cc407-9W
Mr. Adley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if she will list, in order of priority, outstanding schemes for major extensions and new construction of hospitals in the Wessex Regional Hospital Board area.

Dr. Owen

The Wessex Regional Health Authority assumed responsibility on 1st April for health services in the Wessex region. It has already conducted a preliminary review of the provisional hospital building programme drawn up by the former Wessex Regional Hospital Board and has put a revised programme to the area health authorities in the region for their consideration. This is by no means a final, still less an agreed, programme, the composition of which will in any case be determined largely by reference to the amounts of capital

Dr. Owen

Available information about the migration of fully or provisionally registered civilian doctors to and from Great Britain is tabulated below.

which the Government can make available to the authority for the years after 1974–75; and I cannot say yet what these will be.

The regional health authority's plans for the current year include starting the following major schemes:—

Christchurch Hospital: Outpatients department and rehabilitation unit.

Royal South Hants Hospital, Southampton: Mental illness unit, boiler house and staff accommodation.

Queen Alexandra Hospital: Staff accommodation.

Dr. Edmund Marshall

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when she will ask the Yorkshire Regional Health Authority to submit a new 10-year programme for hospital construction.

Dr. Owen

Hospital construction programmes roll forward each year to reflect reviews by the health authorities of health service development as a whole in the light of policy guidelines my right hon. Friend provides and the level of resources likely to be available. She will issue guidance on these matters later this year to enable authorities to consider plans for 1975–76 and subsequent years.

Mr. Cordle

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services, in view of the large elderly population in Bournemouth and the present shortage of hospital beds and operating theatres in the area, whether she is able to confirm that construction works for the New Bournemouth District General Hospital will begin as planned in 1977.

Dr. Owen

The starting date for the new hospital is a matter for determination by the Wessex Regional Health Authority in the light of the capital allocations received by it from the Government for health building work. As I cannot yet say what that authority's allocations of capital will be for years after 1974–75, I cannot confirm that construction will start in 1977.