St Helena Hospice chairman: We pay going rate for managers

The planned closure of the Tendring Centre does not mean the closure of St Helena’s services.

All services run at the centre will continue at one or more alternative locations in the area.

We at St Helena are hugely grateful for the dedicated support of the local community.

What we don’t want is for your money to be spent on a building which is no longer cost effective when we can deliver the same support to patients, families and carers for less at other premises.

We recognise how much the centre has meant to people over the years.

However, our care is more than just a building: our services are provided wherever the patient requires it – at home and through our 24/7 SinglePoint help line as well as at The Hospice in Colchester.

St Helena’s management costs are similar to those of other hospices and charities.

As we do for all staff, we externally benchmark our senior staff salaries against similar organisations to ensure we pay the going rate.

All decisions on senior salaries are taken by a remuneration committee made up of trustees from our board.

As part of ongoing efforts to deliver our care more cost effectively we have actually reduced management costs since 2016 by 9 per cent.

However, in order to be more transparent, in 2017 we changed the way we report salaries so that, for the first time, this now includes pension costs.

The rise in the overall cost of running St Helena has been due to the introduction of new services and the expansion of existing ones including Singlepoint, our Hospice in the Home community services and our Bereavement Support.

As a result of these changes, we now help over 50 per cent more local people to face incurable illness and bereavement each year.

The increase in our costs has been driven by these changes and has nothing to do with the decision to close the Tendring Centre.

Peter Vergo

Chairman, St Helena Hospice