Campaigner Delivers Hospice Funding Letter to Downing Street Backed by Nearly 200 MPs as Government Highlights £125m Investment

Corin Dalby handed a letter to 10 Downing Street on Tuesday calling for immediate and sustainable funding for hospices. The chief executive and co-founder of Box Power CIC was joined by Liverpool West Derby MP Ian Byrne during the delivery. Dalby, from Bolton, said hospices need immediate and sustainable funding.

He said the beds are there and just need to be reopened, adding that reopening hospice beds would take the strain off the NHS. Dalby said hospices provided essential, compassionate care to patients and families at the most vulnerable moments in their lives. He said many hospices were battling rising costs, increasing demand and widening funding gaps.

Dalby said he had seen many hospices with empty bedrooms simply because funding and staffing pressures mean they cannot safely be operated. He said it makes no sense that hospices are having to fundraise hard just to make up for the part that the government is not funding. Dalby said this needs to end.

He said it costs more for people to be in hospital beds, so it is self-funding. Dalby started his campaign after local hospices asked for funding. Byrne said funding of end-of-life care was desperately needed and should be a priority.

The Labour MP said Liverpool is now down to one hospice following the loss of Marie Curie. He said one hospice is nowhere near substantial enough for the city of Liverpool's size. Byrne said there has nearly been the closure of Zoe's Place Children's Hospice in Liverpool.

Lord Stuart Polak said the hospice movement was one of the most important in the country and shouldn't be reliant upon charitable giving. Lord Polak said his father died in the Marie Curie Hospice in Liverpool in 2019 after spending two days there with pancreatic cancer. He said his mother was cared for in the Marie Curie Hospice in Liverpool for three months in 2023.

The Marie Curie Hospice in Liverpool closed in 2024 due to a shortage of specialist nursing staff. The Department of Health and Social Care made a £125m investment to improve hospice facilities. The government committed £80m for children's and young people's hospices over three years.

The Department of Health and Social Care will soon set out plans to modernise and improve the palliative and end-of-life care sector. The Department of Health and Social Care said hospices are playing a central role in delivering care closer to home. The Department of Health described its £125m investment as the biggest investment in hospices in a generation.