WELSH health chiefs have been invited to a public meeting to give an explanation as to why 8,000 Gloucestershire patients are being denied their legal rights on access to healthcare.

Action4OurCare has been campaigning for several years to ensure that English patients at Welsh-registered surgeries get their legal right to access English health services.

The group is holding a public meeting in St Briavels to ‘expose’ the fact that patients living in England but who are on the books of Welsh-registered GPs are still being treated ‘unlawfully’.

Invitations have gone out to Welsh health minister Mark Drakeford, NHS Wales chief executive Andrew Good-

all and Judith Paget, the chief executive of the Aneurin Bevan health board.

This is “in order to give them an opportunity to explain to patients the stance they are taking,” said Pam Plummer of Action4 OurCare.

She said patients living in England are:

•Still being treated unlawfully despite being legally entitled to be treated since April 2013 under NHS England rules – which was confirmed by both the Department of Health and NHS England.

•Being kept in ignorance of their rights because an ‘unaccoun-

table’ Welsh government is delaying a solution identified by NHS England which could be implemented in a matter of weeks.

•Not being told what will happen to their healthcare arrangements once the cross-border protocol expires tomorrow (Thursday).

The Welsh-registered GP practices with residents in Gloucestershire are: Dixton Road and Castle Gate surgeries

in Monmouth, Mount Pleasant in Chepstow, Towngate in Sedbury, Vauxhall in Tutshill, Wye Dean in Tintern and the Wye Valley practice in St Briavels.

Mrs Plummer said: “People living in England are legally entitled to be treated to the same waiting times and choices as the rest of the population of England.

“If their GP is under contract in Wales, they are treated as if they were living in Wales and to NHS Wales rules which are different.”

That means they get less choice of hospitals, no access to the English cancer drug fund and potentially longer waits for hospital treatment.

Mrs Plummer said they were not criticising individual practices which have no control over the situation.

Forest MP Mark Harper and Dr Marion Andrews-Evans of the Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group have confirmed they will be at the meeting which is due to take place at The Pavilion in St Briavels on Saturday, April 16 at 10am.