THE campaigner who raised concerns over a Forest Community Interest Company (CIC) which cost a great deal of money but allegedly delivered nothing, says she is worried local health care may follow the same route.

Dr Daphne Pearson says she also fears for the whole future of home care and health provision in the Forest in the coming split-up of the Primary Care Trust (PCT) "because nobody knows what is going to happen."

The Government has announced that Gloucestershire PCT, along with other PCTs throughout Britain, will no longer be responsible for providing services as well as commissioning them for local access after next April.

Instead the provision of health and care services will fall to a new county-wide body (the preferred route to this being a Social Enterprise Fund venture), while commissioning is to be passed on to GPs either in one body representing the whole county or smaller commissioning groups for areas such as the Forest (to take place by April 2012).

Dr Pearson points out that the Forest CIC, itself set up to oversee health services here, was regarded as a Social Enterprise Fund project until it was clear it had no funding from this direction even though some £230,000 had been spent on consultancy fees.

Dr Pearson says it is worrying the new body overseeing health and care provision could be steered into making the same costly mistakes over consultation as the Forest CIC's steering group.

"I am also concerned the provision group and the commissioning group could fall into the hands of amateurs. That would be a disaster," she said, adding that people were becoming upset by the lack of clarity on the issue.

On Tuesday a PCT spokesperson told the Review she was certain the changes ahead were organisational.

"The community hospitals are safe, everyone will still have their jobs and pension entitlements and patients will still have access to the same range of NHS services as today," she said.

There is to be a meeting of Forest health officials and members of the PCT concerning the changes on November 20 (2pm-4pm) at the Main Place in Coleford when Dr Pearson, who works with Forest Age Concern, says she hopes to raise some of the issues.