NHS Hospital Car Parks

On Monday the BBC ran this report on Primary Care Trust hospital care parking income. A staggering 95 million with 74 Trusts not providing any data. Thirty Trusts make over 1 million from their car parks whilst two make over 2 million.

The Department of Health's guide Income Generation, Car Parking Charges - Best Practice for Implementation says

27. NHS bodies are strongly recommended to have some kind of ‘season ticket’ arrangement, allowing free or reduced price parking for:

- patients with a long-term illness or serious condition requiring daily or regular treatment;

- relatives/prime visitors of patients with a long-term illness or a serious condition requiring daily or regular treatment.

28. NHS bodies are also recommended to have a weekly cap on car parking charges for patients/visitors having to attend on a daily basis.

The Central Manchester and Manchester Children's University Hospitals Trust has this information for out-patients. However, information for our own hospital and Manchester's other cancer treatment hospital, Christies, are not provided. All out patient paarking is commercial apart from 26 places in the A & E car park which is free for just 30 minutes.

Macmillan Cancer Support are not content. This press release was issued yesterday. They have started a Travel and Parking campaign which is calling for:

• patients undergoing treatment for cancer should be eligible for assistance on a mon means-tested basis under the Hospital Travel Costs Scheme (HTCS)
• patients undergoing treatment for cancer should be exempt from all hospital parking charges
• the HTCS should be better publicised and reimbursement arrangements simplified
• cancer patients travelling to hospital for cancer treatment should be exempt from all charges and tolls for using roads, tunnels and bridges

Their latest report which makes interesting reading and highlights the finacial hardship caused to cancer patients by travel and parking can be found here in pdf format.

Update: Information on car parking at Christies Hospital can be found here.