Torquay land sale ‘not just another hospital car park’

Selling a piece of land on a Torquay business park to the local healthcare trust will be an investment in the future and not just another car park, councillors have been assured.

The Torbay and South Devon NHS Trust – the biggest employer in Torbay – wants to use the land near the Wickes store at Edginswell for parking for up to five years, but plans to move medical electronics departments and patient transport services there after that.
Torbay Council deputy leader Chris Lewis (Con, Preston) said selling the land to the trust was a ‘strategic investment in the future of healthcare for our community’.
But shadow cabinet leader Swithin Long (Lib Dem, Barton with Watcombe) warned him: “In 20 years time it could still be a car park!”
Councillors on all sides said they had concerns over the proposal to sell the land, which is designated for employment use, if it was only going to become a parking area.
But an 11th-hour letter from health trust chief executive Joe Teape explained that the trust had other plans for it. The ‘extraordinary’ cabinet meeting itself was called with just one item on the agenda because a deal had to be done by the end of March to secure funding.
In his letter Mr Teape said the vision for the site was to accommodate a range of healthcare support services, and moving them away from the main hospital site would release land there for projects including a possible multi-storey car park and other major buildings to modernise the hospital.
Cllr Alan Tyerman (Con, Churston with Galmpton) said he had concerns over the possible loss of employment land until the late letter explained the details. And, he said, the council retained the right to take back the land if it was not used as intended.
In light of that, he said, selling it was ‘absolutely’ the right thing to do.
Council leader David Thomas (Con, Preston) highlighted the trust’s controversial decision last week to end a 20-year partnership with the council to deliver adult social care.
He said: “I remain deeply disappointed about that, and I am very conscious that people might expect today to be about settling the score, and revenge for a decision that did not go my way, but that’s not what leadership looks like.
“We will act in the interests of our community and not in the heat of the moment.”
But Cllr Long asked: “Why are we pandering to an NHS that has shown it doesn’t want to work in partnership? True leadership would have stuck by that site as employment land.”
Cllr Lewis said the sale would generate immediate benefits in terms of more parking for the hospital site where spaces are notoriously hard to find. And it would take some of the parking pressure off nearby residential streets.
“This is a really good opportunity,” he said. “To throw this away when they have got government money for it would be absolutely outrageous.”