Patients cancel hospital appointments to avoid paying exorbitant parking charges .

Lysette Anthony overstayed in the car park while son Jimi was being treated
Patients are cancelling vital appointments because of 'exorbitant' hospital parking charges.
At least one trust in London is charging up to £3 an hour to park - even if those doing so are receiving crucial treatment.
Health campaigners called the charges a 'stealth tax'.
Researchers
from BBC1's Inside Out programme spoke to patients who said they could
not afford to pay. Pensioner Joan Laurance had heart surgery at the
Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead last year and needed a week of
rehabilitation. Doctors warned her not to take public transport for
health reasons - but driving would have cost her £45 for a week's
parking.
Instead, she chose not to attend therapy.She said: 'The patients who do go to rehabilitation live quite a bit
longer than those who don't. But it costs you £3 an hour to park, which
I think is a prohibitive sum. It was much too expensive to spend, three
hours a day for five days.'
Actress Lysette Anthony said
she was fined £60 for a 20-minute overstay at Great Ormond Street
Hospital. Her son Jimi, four, has juvenile arthritis and was being
operated on. She said: 'We were given a £60 ticket because we couldn't
leave our son on the operating table to go and satisfy Camden council.
Quite apart from the expense, anyone who says 'get a cab' clearly
doesn't have a child because cabs don't have car seats.'
Hospital
parking charges have been scrapped in Scotland and Wales, but not in
England. Geoff Martin, of campaign group London Health Emergency, said:
'We have NHS trusts effectively imposing a stealth tax not just on
patients and their visitors but also on staff.'
A spokesman
for Kingston hospital said: 'The trust is well served by public
transport and we have invested in initiatives to encourage cycling and
walking to work.'
A spokeswoman for the Royal Free said
charges were set at £3 an hour in 2000 to deter commuters. She added:
'There are dispensations for certain groups. These include visitors to
patients who are near death or having regular treatment for cancer.
The trust is trying to identify other groups who could qualify.'



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