BEFORE the last election I warned that there were no costings for the new hospital at Airedale and no clear allocation of funding. I was therefore very worried that pre-election promises of a complete rebuild might not be delivered.

I didn’t expect to be proved right so quickly by the new government. The decision to authorise a rebuild is now being reviewed.

Any pause in the construction of this new facility will be incredibly dangerous. RAAC concrete doesn’t stop crumbling because the new government wants to review decisions taken by the last one. The best date that the new hospital could have been completed by was 2030. Any delay means trying to hold the building up with building supports for longer than those six years and that must create a serious risk of closure.

Patching up and partial improvement are simply inadequate to meet the scale of the challenge of dealing with the consequences of poor quality building materials being used in the last construction.

Airedale hospital is a vital facility covering a huge area and a large population. It needs a complete rebuild and we don’t have the luxury of taking time to undertake further reviews.

I wonder how many people who voted for the new government in the last election expected that their reward would be delays and dither over unavoidable reconstruction of our local hospital and the risk of no new hospital at all.

Cllr Andy Brown Green Party

Cononley

Note - see https://www.cravenherald.co.uk/news/24492662.health-leaders-committed-airedale-hospital-rebuild/