Joy at charity money U-turn (From Halesowen News)

Joy at charity money U-turn

12:40pm Tuesday 9th February 2010

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By David Paine »

A WORCESTERSHIRE campaigner is celebrating a Government U-turn on plans that sparked fears the Treasury would dip into charitable donations given to hospitals.

We previously reported how Labour ministers were looking at imposing new rules on NHS charities requiring all donations – including those given to specialist children and cancer units, local fund-raising campaigns, teaching hospitals and local community trusts – to be listed on a hospital’s balance sheet from April.

That sparked fears the donations could then be used to help balance the books of hospitals at a time when public spending is under pressure and budgets need to be cut. Ministers are currently banned from counting charitable donations towards the central NHS budget.

The Conservatives announced last week that it would scrap the proposed rule if it won the next general election, and Labour has since followed in announcing it has deferred deciding on the matter for at least 12 months.

That has delighted Helen Donovan who set up a petition on 10 Downing Street’s website urging the Government to drop the plans – 325 people signed it since its inception last month.

Mrs Donovan, of St Margaret’s Road, Evesham, said: “It’s brilliant. Everybody has done their bit.”

Conservative would-be MP for Worcester, Robin Walker, who signed the petition, also welcomed the U-turn by the Government.

Worcester’s Labour MP Mike Foster, who had written to Health Secretary Andy Burnham about the proposals, said: “It did leave an odd taste and people were quite right to be concerned about it."

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