Along with more than 100 others, I attended the Future Fit workshop in Ludlow last week. My report on it is here. But it seems that it doesn’t matter what we said on that day, Future Fit is unlikely to take Ludlow’s views into account. Future Fit consultants, Participate Ltd reported on the consultation events on Monday, and they didn’t include Ludlow.
The Future Fit Deliberative Engagement Events Report, which is due to go to Future Fit board, says:
“The events were held in late August 2014 in Wem, Telford, Newtown (Powys) and Shrewsbury.”
What about us in Ludlow? Oswestry wasn’t included either. We are being ignored because our events were in September. Ludlow and Oswestry are second and second best in the Future Fit framework.
There will of course be a second report, but it is going to be this first report that formulates the opinions of Future Fit board members. The consultation events Future Fit ran in September, including in Ludlow, will always be playing second fiddle to the rest of the county and Telford. The south of the county was consulted second, will be reported second and will always be second best in Future Fit.
That’s wrong and I think it’s a betrayal of the people who turned out to the meeting in Ludlow. Future Fit should have waited for the entire consultation to be complete before presenting a report to its board. The whole Future Fit programme is now likely to have a bias against the rural south of the county.
On a final point, I am astounded that no one under-35 attended the workshops according to the report. Don’t younger people have say in the health care that will be delivered in their lifetime?