Islington News: Finsbury Health Centre | Public Meeting | Wendy Savage | Keep Our NHS Public | Holy Redeemer Hall | Exmouth Market

Publications by New Journal Enterprises

Home

Archive

Competition

Islington Tribune - by TOM FOOT
Published: 31 October 2008

Wendy Savage

Health centre campaigners battle on

A MAJOR public meeting has been called as campaigners step up their fight to save Finsbury Health Centre.
Wendy Savage, one of the founders of the Keep Our NHS Public campaign, will speak at Holy Redeemer Hall in Exmouth Market at 7pm on Thursday. She will be joined by campaigners, architectural experts, a local historian and a representative from Islington Primary Care Trust (PCT).
The PCT is to sell the centre, a Grade I-listed building in urgent need of repair, to a private developer. Services based there – including general practice, dentistry, podiatry and the Michael Palin Stammering Centre – will be moved elsewhere in the borough.
The cost of refurbishment is put at about £4million, a figure the PCT argues would be better spent directly improving health in Islington.
Patient Barb Jacobson said: “For all the talk about the supposedly ‘high cost’ of refurbishing Finsbury Health Centre, the PCT still has not made a clear financial case for leaving the centre. Nor is it clear how patients will benefit from this move of specialist services nearly three miles away.”
The centre, designed by architect Berthold Lubetkin, was described as the “pride of the borough” when it opened in 1937. To sign the Stop the Sell-Off of Finsbury Health Centre petition go to www.savefinsburyhealthcentre.wordpress.com

Comment on this article.
(You must supply your full name and email address for your comment to be published)

Name:

Email:

Comment: