A COUNCILLOR has described an upcoming shake up of local NHS services as “unintelligible” - and said most people would struggle to understand what it meant.

The Government’s recent Health and Care Bill will create a series of Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) that will officially be their work in April.

The ICSs are partnerships between organisations that deal with the health and care needs of local areas.

They will replace the current Clinical Commissioning Groups that perform similar tasks.

The change was discussed at a meeting of Bradford Council’s Health and Social Care Scrutiny Committee on Thursday night, when representatives of local health bodies gave a presentation on the shake up to Councillors.

But some members of the Committee had a rather cynical view of the shake up - pointing out it was the latest in a long line of reorganisations of NHS services.

Other said the changes would mean nothing to the person on the street.

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The report to members said it would provide “a high level overview of the plans for the evolution of our integrated health and care partnership arrangements in Bradford District and Craven, and across the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership.”

It added: “ICSs will be comprised of an Integrated Care Partnership and an Integrated Care Board. It is anticipated that place based working will remain critical in the future and many of the ICS functions will be discharged through place based partnerships. Locally, we will have a West Yorkshire ICS with five separate places, mirroring the current CCG footprints.”

The report and presentation seemed to confuse Councillors who had a medical background.

Councillor Paul Godwin (Lab, Keighley West) has worked in the pathology department of Airedale Hospital.

At the meeting he said: “I represent 12,000 voters in my ward, and after this meeting I won’t be able to go and speak to them about what has been discussed.

“It might mean something to you, but the test is could you explain it to your children?

“It is unintelligible. I have three degrees, and I don’t have a clue about what you’re going to do with the NHS.

“I know what the NHS does, I have been through six reorganisations.

“The people I represent want to know who to go to when things go wrong.

“Every time you reorganise the NHS you make it less ineligible to the person on the street.”

Chair of the Committee Councillor Vanda Greenwood (Lab, Windhill and Wrose), said: “Most people don’t know what a CCG is so they are not going to know what is happening here.

“Patients don’t have a voice. People out there don’t care about this type of stuff, they have no idea whatsoever about it, but they want a voice and deserve a voice.”

Councillor Ralph Berry (Lab, Wibsey), who has been part of similar local NHS organisations, said: “Another year another NHS reorganisation. I’ve been through five as a Councillor, and I’ve been abolished twice.”

Councillor Alun Griffiths (Lib Dem, Idle and Thackley), said: “In another seven years things will probably be reorganised again, and we’ll end up starting from scratch.”