8:20am Monday 22nd March 2010
By Joanne Moore
Controversial plans to build a primary care centre on land near Quakers Walk, Devizes, were today scrapped by the health trust.
Wiltshire NHS chief executive Jeff James said the plan was no longer financially viable. It means that after four years of talking about a new health centre for the town he will have to go back to the drawing board.
And he admitted he was no longer confident that money could be found in the short term for a centre to be built at the original site in Green Lane.
He said: "In recent years financial restraints have become toughter. We will have to look at a more imaginative way to take this forward."
He said the trust remained committed to providing better health facilities in the town but it seemed he may be shying away from creating a new centre to house all the town's GPs, out patient clinics and x-ray under one roof.
He said he could not give any timescale for a new plan going ahead.
He will be at the Devizes Area Board meeting tonight to discuss the latest twist to the long running saga.
Camapaigners who did not want the centre built at Quakers Walk will be celebrating but others will be worried the town will be left with out-dated services.
The trust is desperate to sell-off Devizes Hospital and the clinic in New Park Street to raise cash but has pledged not to do this until a new centre has been built.
It is unclear if St Monica's Trust, which wants to build an old people's home at Quakers Walk will still push ahead with its plan on its own. Today it said it did not want to comment at this stage.
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