Southborough Hub and Medical Centre
Thursday, 1 August, 2019
Following concerns that the proposed Southborough Hub was in jeopardy Greg convened an urgent meeting yesterday of members and officers from the three local authorities involved in the project in a bid to break the deadlock.
The meeting succeeded in bringing all of the parties from Southborough Town Council, Tunbridge Wells Borough Council and Kent County Council together in agreement that scheme should proceed without delay, and should meet the NHS England deadline of 2 August.
As a result of the meeting, Southborough Town Council agreed to hold an Extraordinary General Meeting at the earliest legal opportunity to ratify the agreement, with the leaders of all political parties represented on the Council pledging their support.
Greg has written to NHS England and the Secretary of State for Health drawing their attention to the agreement.
The new development at Southborough, which includes investment of £4.2m from NHS England is the first such investment in the country that has been made in this way, and reflects a successful bid from a fund that was 8 times oversubscribed.
Greg said: "I was alarmed to hear that the new medical centre for St Andrews Surgery, football pavilion, library and hall could be lost to the Southborough community because of a failure to agree terms between the partners. I was pleased to be able to bring people together to broker a solution in time for the deadline and I am pleased we were able to break the deadlock.
"The whole community wants these facilities to be built without delay and I hope that it will now be full steam ahead."
Supporting local communities and businesses
We are lucky to live in one of the most beautiful places in Britain and we need to work together to keep our towns and villages vibrant. I work closely with Parish Councils and community groups throughout the constituency to ensure that our towns and villages are great places to live, work and visit.