Hazel Grove MP Lisa Smart is 'hopeful' about the future of Stepping Hill hospital following a meeting with the government health minister.

Ms Smart met with Labour health minister Karin Smyth and described 'constructive' talks over future improvements to Stepping Hill Hospital, and the potential for a future second site.

The health minister will visit Stepping Hill Hospital later this year, and also promised to work with local healthcare leaders to ensure that ambitions on improvements could be met.

"It was a positive step to get this level of engagement from the Minister", Lib Dem MP Lisa Smart said.

"While the Minister focused on the Government's spending review, and their 10 year plan for the NHS, the overall tone was constructive.

"Being able to sit face to face and really get into the practical steps needed to move this forward was a real positive. Now we need to see concrete action."

Earlier this year, Lisa Smart and fellow MP Tom Morrison called for more funding for Stepping Hill hospital repairs, after it was left out of the government's New Hospitals Programme (NHP).

The NHP is a plan to provide funding for improvements at around 40 hospitals across the UK, to be delivered in a number of separate waves and schemes. Stepping Hill is not included in the list.

In his foreword to the NHP, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: "I would rather take tough decisions which are the right decisions for the future, than lead patients up a garden path once more only for them to be let down again."

Speaking earlier this year, a Department for Health spokesperson also said: "No one is under any illusions the NHS estate we inherited is crumbling, following years of neglect, but repairing and rebuilding our hospital estate is a key part of our ambition to create a health service for the future.

"At the budget, we announced £1bn to address the backlog of critical NHS maintenance, repairs and upgrades, and tackle dangerous RAAC concrete, as part of the highest capital budget in real terms since before 2010."

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