Scarborough, Bridlington and York hospital staff parking charges revised

Staff parking charges are set to be revised at Scarborough, Bridlington and York hospitals after feedback from staff

Plans to reintroduce staff parking charges at three hospitals have been revised after "an awful lot of feedback", a health trust has said.

The charges are due to be put back in place at Scarborough, Bridlington and York hospitals in June after they were suspended during the Covid pandemic.

Bosses at York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals had defended the move, saying funding was withdrawn in April 2022.

But the charges would now depend on how far staff lived from work, they said.

At a meeting of its board on Wednesday, the trust's chief executive Simon Morritt said some staff would now be eligible to apply for a parking permit.

"We have also introduced an extenuating circumstances panel because there are always individual cases," he said.

Staff living further than five miles from York Hospital will now be eligible for a parking permit, the trust says

Chair of the board Alan Downey told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that staff living more than two miles from Scarborough Hospital, five miles from York Hospital, and one mile from Bridlington Hospital would be eligible for a permit.

The planned reintroduction of parking charges on 12 June was previously criticised by staff, some of whom said they already felt "undervalued" and that public transport was not an option for many of them.

Members of the public also criticised the decision, with some stating that healthcare staff should not have to pay for parking, while others raised concerns the move would lead to more on-street parking in residential areas near the hospitals.

A petition against the charges has so far attracted nearly 1,000 signatures.

Mr Morritt said the decision to revise the plan came after "a number of discussions with groups of staff", including in Scarborough.

"It's only a few months since I reintroduced the chief executive staff surgery and I had a delegation of about 35 staff in Scarborough, all wanting to talk about the parking," he said.