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Consultation

Consultation on the closure of Credenhill Surgery

Response to Credenhill Parish Council’s letter to HMG following ongoing closure of Credenhill Surgery:

Thank you for your letter dated 22nd November 2023 in relation to the Hereford Medical Group (HMG) branch surgery at Credenhill. Your letter is timely as we have recently been reviewing the options in relation to the branch site at Credenhill.
You will, no doubt, be aware of the history of the site at Credenhill which was formerly a branch surgery of Quay House Medical Centre and up until the pandemic, operated for 5 half days per week. As part of the review, we have considered the viability of the branch surgery and have concluded that we must commence a consultation on the closure of the branch surgery with patients and stakeholders. In making this decision, we have considered the following:

The premises is not fit for purpose –
o it is a remote one consulting room and one nurse treatment room premises which is a converted shop unit. All other HMG premises are purpose built.
o The clinical environment needs significant investment to bring it up to modern standards.
– Whilst it is currently being used for storage of patient records, the fact that the premises is not accessible to the community is an issue which needs to be resolved.
– The surgery does not meet disability access requirements and there are limited options to change this.
– It is potentially safety risk having unwell patients at a remote site
– There is no dispensary at the site.
– To keep it open would result in a reduction in service at other sites.


I would like to take this opportunity to reassure you that there are no plans to change the boundary for HMG and all patients registered with the practice will continue to be able to access healthcare at our other sites.
The consultation that we have launched today will run until 24th December 2023, following which we will review the responses and finalise any decision. If the Practice concludes to proceed with closure, then a formal application will be made to the Herefordshire and Worcestershire Integrated Care Board (HWICB).
The consultation will be available online at: https://forms.office.com/r/SZrdPjexAs or using the QR code below:

This information will be available on our website and on our social media pages. In addition, along with this letter to the Parish Council, we will be writing to the council, MPs and other local stakeholders. Paper copies of the consultation survey will also be available at all of our other sites. We are also hoping that the Credenhill Community News will publish details of the consultation.
I note from your correspondence, along with a second letter from the pharmacist based at Kington, that there might be some interest in a change of use. In this regard I will be writing to the pharmacist to explain how this might proceed. However, I would note that it is not within our gift to authorise any such application which would need to be made initially to the ICB.
In relation to the development of a new site at Credenhill, this is something which would need wider system involvement as whilst s106 monies might be made available, these only contribute towards capital costs with ongoing costs being picked up via HWICB.
I hope that this letter provides sufficient information to the Parish Council and assurance that we are keen to progress with plans to ensure that the premises is brought back in to community use. I look forward to receiving any comments as part of the consultation, but if there are any further questions then please do not hesitate to contact me.

https://forms.office.com/r/SZrdPjexAs

Help improve health and wellbeing in Herefordshire

Dear residents

Herefordshire Council would like to hear from you about how we can improve health and wellbeing in Herefordshire.

We are working with health services and other organisations to develop a strategy and actions to improve health and wellbeing in the county over the next 10 years, and we are asking residents for their views about the things that they think are most important.

From information already available we have identified a number of issues that are most affecting the health and wellbeing of residents in our county and from these we have suggested some potential priorities for action, or for additional action where there is already work being done.

But we really want to know what your views are and about the things that you think we should be doing. 

Feedback from this consultation will be available to view early in 2023 and it will help decide the priorities and content of the Health and Wellbeing Strategy which is due to be published in the Spring of 2023.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and we would greatly appreciate it if you could spare a few minutes to complete our survey which you will find by clicking the link below.

For more information and to share your views and ideas, see: www.herefordshire.gov.uk/hwbs

Roman Park – Survey

In December 2021 the Parish Council successfully applied for a grant for an outdoor fitness zone at the Roman Park. This was successfully installed in April and has now been in place for just over 6 months.

A condition of the grant application is that we provide feedback on the project, we therefore need your help to give this feedback.

By providing feedback it will ensure that we can apply for further grants in the future and we are interest to hear your opinions and get your ideas for future projects.

Please complete the below survey for your household:

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/Q76NP55

The implications of the Local Plan Consultation on Credenhill

Herefordshire Council are consulting on the Local Plan 2021-2041 Place Shaping Options from Monday 13 June to Friday 29 July 2022. 

The new Local Plan will determine growth and development in Herefordshire over the next 20 years. Place Shaping explores options on areas for new housing and employment across the county.

What does this mean in simple terms to the Parish of Credenhill?

Simply: at least 165 houses in addition to those already planned; but we do not know how many more at this early stage.

Why “at least” 165 more houses in Credenhill?

The current policy has a target of 149 houses for Credenhill; with the Orchard House development (67) and the land to the north east of the school (100) plus those already built and a few smaller plots we will exceed our existing target by 45 houses. The current policy assumes growth spread evenly accross the county; this policy is changing.

Work has been completed by Herefordshire Council to assess how sustainable a village/town/parish/city is within the county; using this assessment areas not seen as sustainable are removed from the model meaning that the sustainable areas will take on a higher proportion of the housing requirement in the county. Credenhill has been assessed as a sustainable parish both in the county model (Option 1a) and within the Hereford City area (Option 1b) – therefore both models being considered include Credenhill.

The county has been set a target of 17,000 additional houses by 2041 by government (based on a population growth model), this is an additional 20.5% of houses. If we assume the current policy of proportional growth then 20.5% of the 802 houses in Credenhill is 165 houses.

Because the options being considered apply the growth to just the sustainable areas and excludes other areas then the figure of 165 can be considered a minimum. We also do not know if those houses which are approved to be built will be build so we think we will have built 45 more houses from the previous target – will we get this taken off the new target?

Looking more realistically at the available land in the parish it may be possible to reach this adjusted target of 165 less 45 = 120 additional homes however any more than this will mean developing on Flood Plain, Farm Land, Woodland, Green Open Spaces or Sports Fields; all of which have significant benefit to remaining as they are.

In the Place Shaping consultation the Parish Council have said that Credenhill should be removed from the sustainable settlements list and should have a target based on growth through land made available from developers through the “Call for sites” exercise.

The link to the consultation is here and we encourage everyone to actively get involved:

https://hlp.commonplace.is/en-GB

Bus service improvement plan survey

Have your say on plans to improve Herefordshire bus services – Friday 16 July to Sunday 15 August 2021

The government recently published its national bus strategy for England called Bus back better. The strategy is encouraging local authorities to work with bus operators to create plans for improving their local bus services and encouraging more people to use them.

The strategy comes with the promise of £3 billion in funding across England to support this and Herefordshire Council intends to bid for funding to be used locally.

Bus service improvement plan for Herefordshire

In response to the national bus strategy, we will be drafting a bus service improvement plan (BSIP) for Herefordshire, in collaboration with the county’s bus operators, and other stakeholders. We aim to publish the final plan on the councils website in October 2021.

Let us know your views

In drafting the plan, it’s important for us to know what you think would improve local bus services and what would encourage you to use local buses more.

We are keen to hear from people who already use buses and from those who currently don’t. We also want to hear from public, private and voluntary organisations who have an interest in local bus services and making them work better.

We would be grateful if you could take a few minutes to complete the survey and encourage others to do so. The survey can be found at www.herefordshire.gov.uk/bus-survey.

Herefordshire Council wants to hear from anyone whose property was affected by flooding in October 2019 or February 2020

Flooding affected much of Herefordshire in October 2019 and February 2020, causing damage to homes, businesses and infrastructure. Herefordshire Council is gathering information from everyone affected to help inform future flood risk management activities in the county. To support this, the Council is asking anyone affected by the flooding to complete our survey. We would be grateful for any comments by 10 December 2020. A consolidated summary of the findings of the survey will be published on our flooding web pages next year.

Complete flood survey

For more information on flooding, see our webpages

Herefordshire Council Physical Activity Strategy Consultation

Herefordshire Council is developing a Physical Activity Strategy to develop a clear approach to physical activity within the county. This will be informed by local priorities and developed in partnership with key stakeholders. As part of this process, we would like to hear from local residents to understand their habits in relation to physical activity, exercise and sport. We would really appreciate it if you could fill in the survey found here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/HerefordresPA

The survey is due to be open for six weeks starting today.

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