Brown Secretly Slashed Health Capital Budget - No Wonder Hatfield Super-Hospital Was Junked

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 2nd Jul 2007

Sandy Walkington, Liberal Democrat candidate for St Albans, has condemned the shocking news revealed in today's Financial Times that Gordon Brown slipped through a massive one third cut in this year's health building budget in one of his last acts as Chancellor.

"No wonder the Hatfield super-hospital was junked even though everyone knows that it is the right solution for Hertfordshire's health needs", he said. "The current consultation about the future configuration of hospitals in Hertfordshire tries to claim that the scrapping of the super-hospital was not about money. Oh really? The tragedy is that we could almost certainly have afforded the Hatfield hospital if only the Chancellor had not been so wedded to PFI with its inflexibility and the need to find extra money to fund the private sector profit which has to be built into every project.

"Liberal Democrats will continue to campaign for Hatfield since it is the right solution for Hertfordshire, smack in the middle of the county and with all the potential synergies with the university", Sandy said. "It is certainly a far better solution for St Albans than either Watford or Hemel Hempstead. And a clean new 21st century hospital building will far better meet 21st century health needs than the string and sealing wax solutions currently being proposed."

ENDS

Note to editors: Copy of FT article attached

For more information, please contact Sandy Walkington on 07802 177317