The West Midlands business community has been called on to back a multi-million-pound fundraising campaign to create a state-of-the-art Marie Curie hospice.
Work is set to start in late May on the new Marie Curie Cancer Care hospice in Solihull, with the Big Build Campaign, launched this week, aiming to raise £7 million towards the cost of constructing it.
The new facility is being built on a green belt site in Marsh Lane, just outside Solihull town centre, and will replace the existing Marie Curie hospice on Warwick Road, which has been operating for 45 years.
It marks the end of a lengthy planning process, with Marie Curie having to contend with some stiff opposition locally to its chosen site.
Hospice manager Liz Cottier said: “The planning application did take longer than we thought it was going to but we are on track now.”
Ms Cottier said the new facility was sorely needed to replace the existing hospice, which was formerly a preparatory school and prior to that two large houses.
“It has served us incredibly well but isn’t fit for purpose any more – it really can’t offer what we wish to offer,” she added.
The new hospice will offer 24 single en-suite bedrooms, compared to 17 now, with direct access to gardens, improved outpatient facilities and expanded day services.
It will also provide a new headquarters for Marie Curie’s Midland community nurses, who are currently based elsewhere, due to space constraints on the existing site.
Ms Cottier said the task ahead was a big one but is hopeful the charity will reach its ambitious target and said: “It is a big, big ask but I am sure we can do it as we get such wonderful support from everyone around the area.
"At the moment the care we offer is fantastic but it is in confined and cramped spaces. We have multi-bedded rooms and they are not very big. The new hospice will offer single en-suite rooms and therefore privacy and dignity.”
It is hoped the new hospice will open its doors towards the end of 2012 or early 2013.
Chris Rawstron, former head of international law firm DLA Piper’s Birmingham office, is chairing the Big Build Appeal Committee.He admitted it would be a challenge to raise £7 million by April 2013 but believed the region as a whole would get behind such a well-known and deserving cause.
