Residents of St Ives are celebrating a "fairytale ending" after raising over a million pounds to save the seaside town's only hospital from being turned into flats. There were fears the site could be turned into holiday flats
The success follows a long campaign The Friends of the Former Edward Hain and the local community in safeguarding the former Edward Hain hospital as a health and well-being centre.
The Friends, and those who campaigned before them, have worked tirelessly to save the hospital since it was closed three years ago, and the community and the town council have stood with them.
The prospects for the site looked bleak, following the NHS’ decision to close the hospital and sell it on the open market. As a public body, the NHS is required to get the best possible price to re-invest in services.
In such a high value market like St Ives, the community feared the worst, that the facility would be re-developed for housing or holiday accommodation and be lost forever as a historic building and valued community facility.
The Friends asked the Town Council to step in and negotiate directly with the NHS, which it was able to do, as a public body. Using these powers, enabled the Friends to buy the site direct, rather than it go to the highest bidder.
With an incredible fundraising campaign and community backing, the friends have managed to raise the NHS Property Services price of £1,020,000 to buy the site and the terms of the purchase have now been agreed.
THe plan is to now bring back charities and health groups into the building to will provide support for people with conditions such as Parkinson’s, dementia and offer wellbeing and preventive services like food quality awareness, yoga and exercise.
Councillor Kirsty Arthur, Mayor of St Ives said “This is such exciting news for St Ives. So often we see valuable facilities disappearing in our towns but this time, the community has won out. I cannot speak highly enough of the Friends’ determination to carry on in the face of such a challenge. But in the end, this all comes down to partnership.
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"This is truly a great example of where the local council and the community can work together to achieve great things. We are so proud to have been able to play our part and all parties, the Friends, the Town Council, the NHS and our local MP, Derek Thomas (who was incredibly active behind the scenes) have got this to work… a fairy tale ending of which our small town should be very proud.”
Lynne Isaacs, chair of the Edward Hain Centre, told the Guardian: “The loss of our hospital was devastating. We’re thrilled that we can bring much-needed health services back to the town.”
The Edward Hain is a well-known and highly significant local building which was a community hospital for almost 100 years.
The memorial hospital was founded by Sir Edward and Lady Catherine Hain in memory of their son, Edward “Teddy” Hain, killed by shellfire at Gallipoli in November 1915, the morning he was due to return home.
Images by Councillor Steve Hynes
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