£600k cuts to cancer support set to be announced

Plans to cut more than £600,000 in funding to a service supporting cancer patients are to go before councillors later.

The Cancer Navigator Service, which is based at the Southport and Formby Cancer Information and Support Centre, provides non-medical support to patients.

It is currently funded by the Southport and Formby Primary Care Network (SFPCN), which manages local funding across 14 GP practices in the borough.

But a Sefton Council report said that due to major national funding cuts of £607,000, these practices had voted they could no longer pay for services sitting outside their mandatory NHS core contract. The proposals put forward by SFPCN will go before a council committee on Tuesday.

The centre - also known as Southport Macmillan Centre - was set up in 2012 to offer emotional and practical support to patients dealing with the many challenges of a cancer diagnosis and treatment.

The funding being cut was originally allocated to primary care networks through national NHS funding used for staffing and baseline capacity across GP practices, and meeting NHS targets to improve patient access.

The council report said it was with considerable regret that, despite recognising the value of the Southport Cancer Information Centre, their member practices concluded unanimously in August that this service fell outside the core contractual requirements, and was no longer affordable by SFPCN.

The funding is set to cease after 31 March.

Southport Macmillan Centre said the Cancer Navigator Scheme had helped more than 600 cancer patients in the Southport and Formby area last year.

Without this funding, the centre will no longer receive direct referrals from local GP practices to match patients with navigators for non-medical guidance, exercise classes, one-on-one or financial support, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

They said the service would continue to operate but would "be greatly reduced" and urged those who had used the service to write to their local MP and GP to highlight the help they had been given.

Liberal Democrat councillor John Pugh said the cuts would "virtually destroy the current service".

"With the government reportedly not prioritising health spending in the budget, finances locally remain rocky and something, we're told, has to give," he said.

SFPCN director Dr Rob Caudwell has previously said the value of the service was not in doubt.

He said they knew it was "a great service to patients" but this was about funds and was nothing to do with quality or value.

The adult social care and health scrutiny committee is set to hear the plans on Tuesday evening.

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