FOREIGN Secretary William Hague was yesterday in the Commons updating the nation on its relationship with Iran. Closer to home, the Richmond MP issued a statement about an issue that will require all of his diplomatic skills.

The plans to downgrade the children’s services at the Friarage Hospital, in Northallerton, in Mr Hague’s constituency, will cause the same fears in Yorkshire that the closure of stroke services did in Darlington.

Mr Hague spoke yesterday of the need for “exhaustive discussion and examination” of all the options.

He is right, but there will be cynicism about whether these discussions will be meaningful. The people of Darlington, for example, vigorously opposed the removal of stroke services to Durham, but the removal went ahead. It felt to some protestors that it was a fait accompli and the public’s views didn’t carry much weight.

The authorities then tried to quell fears that the stroke decision would lead to Darlington being denuded of other services, and yet yesterday’s Friarage report contains a throwaway line that “there is a big unknown about what is happening in Darlington. If Darlington hospital services transfer to Durham…”

The fear will be that if the Friarage cannot support paediatric services, what services in the long run will it be able to support?

Mr Hague also says: “The desire to increase specialisation in paediatric services must be set against the dangers and inconvenience to patients…”

There may be clinical and financial factors driving these consolidations, but they never seem to take into account the experience of ordinary people who use the hospitals. As well as the greater dangers of greater distances, for ordinary people in remote Yorkshire, Darlington and Middlesbrough are long and expensive journeys away, particularly if you are unfortunate enough to be making the journey regularly.

And, although this may seem minor, if you are bringing all of these people by car to Darlington Memorial, where are they going to park?

Mr Hague said: “Every possible way of maintaining these services should therefore be discussed.”

We hope that it will.