Community Health Groups Get $1.8m

Health Minister Bill English announced today that he had approved funding of more than $1.8 million to community health providers.

The funding has been approved under the Community Trust Assistance Scheme to the WALSH Trust in Auckland, the Richmond Fellowship in Auckland, Northern Southland Medical Trust in Lumsden, and Te Aroha and District Health Services Charitable Trust in Te Aroha.

"The Government is keen to support health providers who are committed to providing the best services for their community.

"A key requirement of the scheme is that initiatives ensure access to services for rural communities, encourage integration of services, and organise care around people's needs, rather than the providers' needs.

"The organisations which will receive the funding are well established and the funding, which is made available to them by way of suspensory loans, will provide them with some security in the future," he said.

The four services are:

WALSH Trust which provides residential rehabilitation to people aged between 18 and 64 with a mental illness in West Auckland. It will receive $605,000 to purchase Langford House from Waitemata Health.
Richmond Fellowship which provides mental health residential rehabilitation services for the Auckland area. It will receive $455,000 to purchase Richmond Court from Auckland Healthcare.
Northern Southland Medical Trust which provides maternity services in Lumsden. It will receive $233,000 to purchase Lumsden Maternity Hospital from Southern Health and to upgrade the facility.
TeAroha and District Health Services Charitable Trust which provides residential and continuing care for the elderly. It will receive $562,500 to purchase Te Aroha Hospital from Health Waikato.
Each funding allocation is conditional upon a number of requirements being met, including the property being cleared for sale through the appropriate mechanisms for the disposal of surplus Crown property.

The Community Trust Assistance Scheme was set up to help community trusts buy local hospital facilities where changes to health service delivery had resulted in the facilities becoming surplus. The scheme was established in July 1996 and expected to run for two years. Applications for funding closed in November 1997.

The scheme was set up with a total budget of $11 million to be allocated over the two year period from July 1996 to June 1998. In August this year an additional $7.8 million was approved to fund existing applicants.

For further information contact:

Liz Rowe, Press Secretary, 04-471 9154 (wk)