This morning I attended as a spectator a meeting where it was hoped the final go-ahead would be given for Stansted’s long-awaited health centre. The board of the West Essex Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) gave the scheme its blessing at about 10 a.m., saying they are”firmly behind it”; BUT they don’t hold the purse strings. The final decision rests with another bureaucracy called NHS England, which, it was said, was also meeting today to decide whether to finance the scheme to the tune of £3.9m over a 21-year lease period. The initial annual lease charge from the developer of the multi-purpose premises is £233,349.

There was widespread frustration earlier today that, 16 months after planning permission was given for the project, the NHS is still haggling over a “small” difference between what the developer wants to pay off his loans and what the NHS wants to pay in rent. It seems that the NHS is unhappy at being asked to pay a higher town centre rent, perhaps because there is an alternative edge of town site where the rent would likely be less but which was abandoned about three years ago.

One frustrated resident at the meeting urged the landlord of the present, totally outdated doctor’s surgery in St. John’s Road immediately to put it on the market for sale; presumably to try to force the NHS’s hand.

I hope that desperate and high risk threats like that can be avoided by NHS England and the developer reaching agreement without further delay. It was said that NHS England is meeting today and that news may come out from their private meeting imminently. If it does, I will post it here.

Read here the business plan which the CCG firmly supported.

UPDATE FRIDAY 31 JANUARY: I have been told that NHS England did NOT approve the expenditure this week and that there will be at least two more weeks’ delay. We await the end of February. Disappointing!