AN NHS England representative was invited to meet with West Devon Borough councillors last week following concerns about the cuts to the out of hours GP service at Tavistock Hospital, but was unable to answer questions raised due to the service being under the management of the NEW Devon Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).

Rachael Crawley, assistant contract manager for NHS England, attended a meeting of West Devon Borough Council’s Overview and Scrutiny (external) committee to answer questions about the recent changes to various services in the West Devon area. Concerns were raised by councillors and a member of the public as to the lack of consultation with the public before a decision was made to cut the out of hours GP service at Tavistock Hospital and reduce the service at Okehampton Hospital.

The cuts, which come into force on October 1, will mean that there will no longer be a GP based at Tavistock Hospital during evenings and weekends and instead people needing the service will have to call the NHS 111 number for advice and an appointment will be booked, if needed, at Derriford Hospital.

However, Ms Crawley said that she was unable to respond to the concerns raised about the out of hours service as it was run by the CCG and not NHS England.

She said: ‘The way the NHS system is set up is that the CCGs are responsible for a vast majority of services on behalf of NHS England. We have direct responsibility for primary care and also a specialist team, which looks after our specialist services. I can only answer to my knowledge and position.’

She did, however, tell the committee that NHS England acknowledged that consultation relating to the closure of the Okement GP Surgery based at Okehampton Hospital in April was ‘negligible and less than meaningful’ and that it had taken on board the views of the public and changed its practises going forward.

Chair of the committee Cllr Debo Sellis said: ‘Clearly with these issues, we need someone from the CCG here so we can scrutinise them.’

Cllr Ric Cheadle agreed: ‘We haven’t been able to answer Mr Eady’s question. The Devon County Council health and well being committee meets on September 19 and the Tavistock issue is due to be discussed. I wonder if we can get the CCG to be represented in some way?’

Cllr Julie Yelland said given the complexity of the relationships within the NHS they should request that there is a representative from both NHS England and the CCG in attendance together.

Cllr Sellis added: ‘This needs to go on our forward plan with CCG and NHS England representatives. As has been highlighted, there is an absolute myriad of layer upon layer of trying to understand the healthcare system.’

It was decided that a working party should be formed to look at the structure of the NHS and seek assurances from both bodies (NHS England and CCG) about how they are going to better consult with the public and specifically look at the issues relating to Tavistock and Okehampton. It will also decide what to ask the CCG when a representative is available to attend a future meeting.