Frank Little

Councillor for East Central ward on Coedffranc Town Council Learn more

Community Health Councils

by franklittle on 24 March, 2009

The Welsh Assembly Government Health Minister, Edwina Hart, has put forward proposals to “strengthen” the CHCs. Basically, the idea is to reduce the number in line with the reduction in the number of Local Health Boards. The detailed proposals, and request for individual comments, are here.

Neath Port Talbot council has also been requested to make comments. The Social Care, Health and Housing scrutiny committee has decided to investigate the implications and make recommendations to the cabinet. As part of the investigation, we will be inviting representatives of a number of bodies affected to give evidence to us on 8th April in Aberavon. The Patients Association is one of those corporate bodies to be invited to send a rep., but if any individual feels that they have a significant contribution to make, for instance as a result of their experiences with theĀ  existing CHC or Local Health Board, please let me or the chair of the committee, Cllr Sheila Penry, know.

   2 Comments

2 Responses

  1. Gary Lewis says:

    Does anyone know what CHC’s do, apart from providing “something to do” for Labour Party Members?

    I recently phoned the Bridgend CHC up, who insisted that they were “independent” – hardly!

  2. franklittle says:

    They do quite a bit. For instance, they have the legal power to enter and inspect hospitals, clinics and other medical facilities. The powers are laid down in a Statutory Instrument, which I’ll try to find a link to.

    My main concern at present is that they don’t have enough publicity, and there is not enough feed-back to the people they represent.

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