THIS is to say thank you to well over 5400 people in both Stroud and Cirencester who signed our joint petition to ask Gloucestershire Care Services to keep our Minor Injuries and Illness Units open over night and, to all the people from the Liberal Democrats, Greens, Stroud Against The Cuts and other groups who worked on this campaign.

Sadly, it appears that Gloucestershire Care Services consultation was nothing but a charade and arguably, the decision to change the hours from 8am to 11pm had already been made well before all of this.

It is disgraceful that people who should work with the public’s best interests at heart can treat local people who pay for the NHS with such disdain and ignore so many.

I also extend this argument to the nurses at Stroud MIIU who have also been ignored and I ask them to work with us and local campaigners before they end up losing their hospital.

However, I am greatly enthused to once again see that Stroud can work cross party to fight for the community and I hope all of you who signed the petition or got involved will not go away quietly.

ln light of the announcement that Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust has a deficit ‘they missed’ of £11.1 million pounds, inevitably we now will have a bigger fight on our hands to save both our local hospital in Stroud and the NHS.

I will be in touch with you all very soon about how we can continue with a wider, longer term campaign in Stroud.

Debbie Hicks

Vice chair of Stroud Constituency Labour Party