The St James Medical Centre’s lease runs out next month and patients fear the landlord will not extend it, reports Sebastian Mann, Local Democracy Reporter
Patients at a Walthamstow medical centre say they feel “badly let down” as the future of their practice hangs in the balance.
St James Medical Practice was supposed to move to a new facility in Brunner Road built as part of Waltham Forest Council’s Jazz Yard development last year. Its current lease ends in October.
The Brunner Road centre, which has sat empty since 2022, is bigger than the current premises and would give patients better access to facilities.
Though it was initially set to open in 2023, the council now says it won’t be fitted out until “early 2026”.
NHS North East London (NEL), which oversees public healthcare in the area, has been holding “high-level talks” with the council and landlord Tribe in recent months.
The integrated care board (ICB) said it was “committed” to working with the practice to ensure its current contractual arrangements remained in place. It will also offer financial support and try to keep any disruption for patients and staff to a minimum.
Johanna Moss, NEL’s chief strategy and transformation officer, said: “We understand this is a difficult time for staff and that recent uncertainty over the move has led to concerns among patients, but we are committed to supporting the practice, including providing resilience funding, to ensure any disruption is kept to a minimum.
“Our priority is ensuring that all patients registered at St James Medical Practice have ongoing access to primary care services until, and after, it moves to its new premises.”
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Though the practice management and patients would prefer to stay on in St James until the fit-out is completed, contingency plans have been drawn up in case a lease renewal cannot be agreed.
With just five weeks to go, patients at the practice are racked with uncertainty.
Long-standing patient Philip Herlihy said: “The lease will run out when I pick up my next prescription – who will issue that? I really don’t know.”
He called the situation “desperate,” adding: “Things really could go wrong, and it was all foreseeable.
“That [Jazz Yard] health centre was finished two years ago and it’s just been sitting there.”
He said he felt NHS management had “badly let us down”.
GP partner Shalini Kawar, who manages the practice, previously said the situation was both “frustrating” and “really sad”.
She told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “We knew things were dragging but we didn’t envision a situation like this.
“Trying to run a practice is impossible with all this hanging over my head. It’s taken me away.”
Ahsan Khan, the deputy leader of Waltham Forest Council, previously said the authority was “doing everything we can to get the best outcome for residents”.
He added: “We are in regular dialogue with the freeholder of the St James practice site, [the landlord], and NHS North East London, who are the leaseholders, to ensure the infrastructure is in place to best serve the needs of local people.”
Tribe was contacted for comment but did not respond in time.
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