A DATE has still not been fixed for crucial talks which will decide whether plans to close Epsom Hospital's A&E and maternity wards will go to public consultation.
The controversial Better Services, Better Value (BSBV) review recommended in May that Epsom should become an elective care centre and lose both its A&E and maternity units.
A committee made up of three members from each of the seven local Clinical Commissioning Groups affected by the review was due to meet to determine whether the recommendations should be put to public consultation.
This meeting was delayed in June until "after the summer" so the financial implications of its proposals could be re-examined on the advice of NHS England.
But this week the review board confirmed it was still not known when the meeting of representatives from the CCGs will be held.
BSBV spokeswoman Shirley Tilney told the Advertiser: "We're waiting on NHS England.
"It is still completing its financial assurance process and until that's completed we can't go ahead with anything at the moment."
But Richard Donelly, from campaign group Keep Our NHS Public, said he believed the delay in the crucial meeting to be political.
He said: "There was clearly huge opposition to it in Epsom and Sutton and in other places as well and they could see that there was quite a large group of people attending all the CCG meetings.
"I think they are worried about the possibility of some sort of legal challenge being made to the review.
"My feeling is that we might not hear anything now until the end of the year."
Meanwhile, BSBV joint medical director Dr Marilyn Plant moved to try to reassure residents over the intentions of the review.
She said: "Some people assume we are part of the government, while others believe we are a body of NHS managers with huge power to make decisions about local hospitals and CCGs.
"The truth is rather more mundane. BSBV is not an organisation. It is the name given to the programme of work to develop proposals for safe, sustainable and high quality services in south west London and Epsom.
"BSBV is a programme led by the CCGs, not something external to them.
"The remit they have given us as an acute services review is to put forward proposals for improving the quality of hospital care and making local health services sustainable.
"This includes proposals for more services being provided outside hospital.
"My main point on out-of-hospital care is that there is only one pot of NHS money and you can't spend more in the community without spending less in hospitals.
"If we spent all our money on community services now, we would put our hospitals in financial difficulty, so changes do need to be phased carefully.
"We have to build the new system, including expanded major acute hospitals and planned improvements to services provided in the community, before the clinicians leading CCGs would agree to any major changes to hospital services going ahead."
