Entire health visiting service under threat at London council

The London Borough of Harrow is considering the drastic move as part of a swathe of cuts across its public health services being put before cabinet members today (December 10).

Documents presented to councillors reveal that in 2018/19 the council could cut the current £3.23m health visiting budget in its entirety.

This comes just two months after the council took over local health visiting services and as public health services England-wide face mounting financial pressures.

Last month, Chancellor George Osborne announced that the government was cutting public health funding by £200m from 2016/17, as part of measures to reduce public debt.

There is also uncertainty over the future of all councils’ statutory responsibility to provide five health visitor checks before the age of two and a half. The regulations around this duty will run out at the end of March 2017.

A council spokesman said no decision around health visiting will be made before 2018.

He added that due to uncertainty around central government funding to local authorities the council was unable to guarantee that it would be able to continue funding health visiting in the long term.

Any decision around health visiting would be subject to a review and “extensive consultation with the public” he said.

He added: “In a broader context, this year’s cut to the public health grant was just the latest of many attacks on our funding for crucial local services. From 2014 to 2018, Harrow Council has had £83m of cuts imposed on it already.”

The Community Practitioners and Health Visitors Association professional officer Dave Munday urged all councils to maintain investment in the service, but acknowledged this was proving difficult in the face of central government cuts.

He said: “This is the reality of the cuts that are being passed down to local authorities from government and councils have to cut their cloth according to their budgets.

“Some councils are looking at taking these really concerning decisions. What we would say is to those considering dropping the number of health visitors to change their minds.”

In total Harrow is mooting £6.47m of public health cuts over the next three years. This includes no longer funding school-based public health programmes, a move that would save £100,000.

Over the next three years, funding for sexual health services for 16- to 18-year-olds could also be cut by £250,000 by 2018/19.

For children and young people, education and commissioning and special educational needs in Harrow, £7.66m of cuts over the next four years are under consideration.

This includes shaving £500,000 off its £2.23m looked-after children placements budget, through negotiating “price reductions and a review of packages of support”.

The proposals for 2016/17 will be subject to public consultation with a draft budget decided in February.