Save Hartismere: Hospital Closure Protest in Eye - 17th September 2005

The Diss Express proves that it can sometimes get news in before it happens by announcing a demonstration in Eye, starting outside Hartismere Hospital on Castleton Way and winding through the centre of Eye to the Town Hall. Nosher was there to take some photos - after all it's not every day that something as dramatic as this happens. The turnout's quite impressive and includes old chum Denny, who I've not seen for a while, as well as local MP Michael Lord (marking the first time I think I've ever seen my local parliamentary representative...) and a few-hundred others. The protest is over the long-threatened closure of Hartismere Hospital, which has been on the cards for ages. Part of the frustration is perhaps not so much that the building itself is being sold off (no doubt to property developers who'll probably buldoze the lot and stick a million rabbit-hutch houses on the site, packed in 20-an-acre) but that if it is, there's nothing to replace it and no other hospitals within a 23-mile radius. Anyway, it's a good-natured demonstration, which doesn't tax the assembled police presence too much (including the police spy-cam-car), although the town centre is closed off for 10 minutes.

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