Mental health cuts 'put public at risk'

Proposed cuts to mental health services in London could put patients and the public at risk, health bosses warned today.

The health service in west London faces a raft of cutbacks in a bid to plug £9 million of debt.

But today doctors attacked further cuts to mental health services, saying reduced funding could mean dangerous patients are released into the community. In a letter to the North West London Strategic Health Authority, a committee representing 100 psychiatrists warned health chiefs that forcing £1million cuts in the area of mental health was "potentially dangerous and unlikely to save money". The warning follows a series of high-profile murders committed by mental health patients where it was found that serious mistakes were made by experts.

John Barrett stabbed Denis Finnegan to death in Richmond Park and Peter Bryan was jailed for life for hacking Brian Cherry to death. Both men were mental patients who had been allowed to walk out of hospital.

Last month the Standard revealed that Kensington and Chelsea Primary Care Trust (PCT), which pays for treatment for patients in its area, is facing a £9 million financial black hole out of a total budget of ?288million.

One source said: "This is £9million of taxpayers' money that has just gone. Doctors are angry that if they mess up and there is a murder committed by a patient they are named and held to account, but managers can waste this kind of money and cover up reports detailing the mess."

Staff are angry that a report carried out by auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers which is understood to be highly critical of the financial management of the PCT, has been withheld.

PCT chief executive Paul Haigh is asking the Central and North West London Mental Health NHS Trust, which has a ?24million contract with the PCT, to come up with £1million of savings.

Mr Haigh said: "Like other PCTs in London we have many pressures on our £288million budget. These have come about for many reasons, including increasing demand on specialist services such as forensic mental health, and more people receiving continuing care at home.

"Our plans involve developing more services in the community, provided by GPs and specialist nurses as alternatives to hospital care. We have made some tough decisions but we have to ensure that we are in the shape to provide a high quality service for our local population now and in the future."

Peter Carter, chief executive of the trust, said any cuts to services would be almost impossible.

"The PCT still has a financial problem," he said. "We must protect our frontline services because there isn't any room to cut them. For the last eight years we have balanced the books and we have run safe services. But I cannot think of a single service we can cut safely."