We relaunched our Whipps Won’t Wait with a Full Council motion on 20th October 2022. Whipps Won’t Wait has been a long campaign that we’ve been pressuring government about for a number of years now. We have seen incremental change but what we need from government now is official confirmation of the funding for the hospital and for construction to start.

The launch highlighting the impact of the delays on our local residents. Council Leader Grace Williams introduced the motion on behalf of Labour Group and Cabinet member Cllr Naheed Asghar spoke movingly of the impact of the delays on health inequalities in our borough. Cllr Richard Sweden, who sits on the Whipps Cross Joint Health Overview Scrutiny Committee also spoke in favour of the motion, highlighting the various stakeholder groups who were calling for the hospital to be urgently built. As the motion was cross-party, we also had speeches from Cllr Emma Best and Tory backbenchers.

Last year, over 11,000 residents signed the #WhippsWontWait petition and we know that this issue is one of significant importance for many residents. With all of the government turmoil, Council Leader Grace Williams made it a priority to write to the new Health Secretary to make sure the hospital is top of his list of key projects to deliver.

You can read the letter here. You can read the full motion here and the motion passed overwhelmingly with support from across the chamber.