Residents Rally To Get Major Hospital In Dover

Calls have been made for Dover to be given a major hospital, at a rally and march through the town centre today.

The event was organised by campaigner Reg Hansell and town councillor David Hannent who said he was pleased with the superb turnout.

"I am fed up with Dover being treated as a second class town. We have been fobbed off by being told that Buckland Hospital will be kept open and made better. These have been lies." said Councillor Hannent.

Mr Hansell said health care provision in Dover was totally inadequate and both the William Harvey Hospital at Ashford and Queen Mother Hospitals were bursting at the seams and could not cope.

"Dover is a strategic location in the United Kingdom and needs and deserves a new hospital. We must cry out loud and clear that we demand our own major hospital."

On behalf of Dover Town Council, Deputy Mayor Sue Jones, said: "We are here to send a clear message that Dover needs a general hospital, open 24 hours a day, that is accessible to the whole district and fit for the 21st century."

MP Gwyn Prosser was unable to attend but sent his best wishes for a successful rally. "I want the Primary Care Trust, East Kent Hospitals Trust and GPs to work together to poroduce enhanced health care facilities on the Buckland Hospital site in the short term, take steps to improve transport for patients, and start planning for a new general hospital for the future," he said.

Conservative prospective parliamentary candidate Charlie Elphicke said plans for a polyclinic were not good enough for Dover. "We have a right to expect a hospital with an emergency centre as a minimum," he said.