County U Turn on stair lifts

1.08.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Wed 13th Dec 2006

Councillor David Garlick

Liberal Democrats claim Victory for the "vulnerable residents of Northamptonshire" in Tory 'U Turn' over Maintenance of Specialist Lifting Equipment

The Liberal Democrats claim vindication of their opposition to the draconian cut to the Major Adaptations budget for the maintenance of Specialist Lifting Equipment. In a dramatic 'U Turn' the County Council Cabinet agreed a temporary reprieve for hundreds of people suffering a disability that requires them to need expensive lifting equipment that can be costly to repair.

In welcoming the change of policy Cllr. Garlick said, "This marks a significant coming together of our opposition to this measure and the will of the users of this equipment to oppose the cuts. It is a great relief to many of them who were concerned about their ability to pay these charges and who felt badly let down by this administration and the Labour Party who failed to support them."

The reasons given for the change confirms many of the points made by the Liberal Democrats and service user groups before this Tory administration took the axe to this service which supports some of the most vulnerable people in Northamptonshire.

But Cllr. Garlick went on to say "Be clear the only listening this administration has done is to challenge from service users and to the subsequent legal advise which I suspect indicates that withdrawing from the contracts with service users is probably illegal and would render the council subject to further court action. This is not a sudden change of direction for the Conservative administration which is still intent on making these cuts. These cuts will still happen but further in the future. Once the current equipment is replaced, any repairs required after the warranty runs out will again fall on the service users in exactly the same way."