CYP Now - Opinion: Soapbox - It's time hospices were government funded

It's a sad fact that children's hospice services in the UK receive on average less than five per cent of their funding from statutory sources.

Of the 43 children's hospice services that are members of theAssociation of Children's Hospices, 16 receive no government funding atall. Many people find this surprising, as indicated by a survey theassociation commissioned in September 2005, which highlighted that justunder half of the public (49 per cent) think that children's hospicesare funded by the government.

This level isn't fair when you consider the diverse range of flexibleservices that they offer free to life-limited children and theirfamilies.

Children's hospices work hard to ensure they provide these services inpartnership with statutory agencies.

It's high time that children's hospices were given a level of statutoryfunding to reflect this. The public thinks so too. A petition deliveredto Downing Street by The Sun Online in partnership with the Associationof Children's Hospices and supermarket chain Somerfield was signed bymore than 250,000 people.

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