Sir,

With the battle over Pembrokeshire health services now truly joined, Pembrokeshire Community Health Council (CHC) - the patients' watchdog - has been challenged as to why we have not stood on the barricades, alongside Chris Overton and others, condemning the tinkering with our local health services.

Why, indeed, did we 'reluctantly' accept the temporary cuts in services proposed by the Pembrokeshire and Derwen NHS Trust which take effect between now and next March?

On this latter point, we only 'reluctantly' accepted these savings on the assurances that they were emergency measures to avoid financial meltdown, that they were temporary and that the CHC, with others, would be directly involved in the strategic planning and budget-setting beyond next March. Elsewhere, we have not sat on our hands. Earlier this year, we campaigned with Mr. Overton against ward closures. Later, we urged the Local Health Board (LHB) and the Trust to amalgamate and save thereby upwards of £1 million a year. We were ignored.

At Trust Board meetings, we have fought for savings to be made in management costs before any patient services were touched. And we have urged that there should be stronger leadership in the Trust where, currently, three of the senior posts are being performed in an acting capacity, including that of chief executive.

Above all, we have argued for long-term, strategic planning by the LHB and the Trust to break out of this annual loop of cuts in services which could be repeated over the next three years at least. And, only this month, our CHC executive has held significant talks with our Assembly Members, Christine Gwyther and Tamsin Dunwoody-Kneafsey, so that our views can be conveyed directly to Dr. Brian Gibbons, the Health Minister in Cardiff.

Forgive us then at the moment if we do not wave placards or seek to grab headlines as we attempt to work with politicians and administrators and thus make a difference. Only if these people who control our health services turn their back on us, will we then leap onto the barricades as the only way to protect the health services for the people of Pembrokeshire.

Geoff Wright, Chairman, Pembrokeshire Community Health Council.