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It's a record: Public make their point

24/ 5/2006

THERE has been a record-breaking response to the Making It Better consultation - parts of which suggested removing women and children's services from Macclesfield Hospital.

More than 55,000 formal written responses were received from the people of East Cheshire, Greater Manchester and High Peak - together with 15,000 responses from the 745 public meetings held across the review area and 1,915 people submitted their views via the website.

The Making It Better children's, maternity and neonatal services consultation ran for 17 weeks and the overwhelming reaction made it the largest ever response to a health consultation anywhere in the UK.

The consultation, a statutory requirement, has so far cost £850,000. But now every single response is to be analysed by an independent organisation to produce an outline report for consideration by the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the Joint Committee of Primary Care Trusts.

An outcome is not expected before September 2006 at the earliest.

Leila Williams, director of the Children's Network, said: "We are surprised but absolutely delighted at the response. It clearly shows the huge importance attached to this area of healthcare and thank everyone for their contribution.

"It means that everyone has really had their say and made it an effective consultation."

John Williams, SHA project director for consultations, said: "This signals the end of a highly successful consultation phase. The process now focuses on the analysis of response and the ultimate decision making to be undertaken by the Joint Committee.

"This will be no easy task and will take some time."