Health leaders in Calderdale have issued a thankyou to all colleagues for their response during this winter challenges so far -  recognised as an unprecendented time for the NHS. At their regular monthly meeting last Friday aimed at collaborating across the system they issued this: 

Statement from Calderdale Health Leaders Group sent by the Leader of the Council, Councillor Tim Swift on behalf of the group which includes Owen Williams, Chief Executive, Calderdale and Huddersfield Foundation Trust;  Matt Walsh, Chief Officer, Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group; Rob Webster, Chief Executive South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust;  and Robin Tuddenham, Calderdale Council Chief Executive.

Last Friday afternoon, we, as Health and Care lead officers and the Leader of the Council, came together for our regular monthly meeting to continue our work on collaboration across the system. We spent time looking at the immediate pressures of today and how we give dedicated time to collectively shape the future of services together.

In sharing the challenges of the last four weeks for our system, we all agreed that the magnificent response of all of you had been apparent in every part of Calderdale. Your skill, creativity,  tenacity and dedication to the people of Calderdale at a time of unprecedented demand, external scrutiny and expectation has been inspiring. We have seen your resilience and your pride. As leaders our role is to  support the work you do now and to seek ambitious ways to deliver the system response to health and care in the future. This will mean more joining up of care, a shift in care within our communities and better coordination with acute hospital and mental health services.

In that context, we agreed to build upon the work of Calderdale Cares, establishing  defining principles, governance and a timeline for action for the next three years. We will seek to build upon the strong and positive conversations on this at the Vanguard Board and the Health and Wellbeing Board in December, by going to the Boards of the CCG, CHFT, SWYPFT and Cabinet over the next two months. This will enable us to set out our aspirations and ambition for health and social care in Calderdale, which we will want to develop further with our workforce and our communities.

Whilst we continue to work this through, thank you for what you are doing each and every day to keep people safe, to ensure effective delivery of health and care and for the person-focused way that you continue to deliver to those we serve.