THE problems being faced by Bootham Park Hospital are nothing new.

As long ago as 2005, health bosses were talking about the need to build a new mental health hospital for York, amid concerns the ageing Georgian building was not up to the job of providing modern mental health care.

Almost a decade on, the Leeds and York NHS Partnership Trust, which now runs local mental health services, is saying very much the same thing. A year ago, the trust’s chief operating officer, Jill Copeland, was clear: a new home was needed for the mental health services provided at Bootham Park.

Yet still nothing is done: and still the building fails to come up to scratch.

Following a routine inspection late last year, the Care Quality Commission concluded Bootham Park was neither suitable nor safe for patients. Inspectors found ‘ligature risks’ – opportunities for vulnerable patients to hang or strangle themselves – on all three wards, and said they had ‘immediate concerns’ about patient safety.

Bootham Park wasn’t the only mental health facility in York to be criticised.

Lime Trees, which provides psychiatric care for young people under 18, was also condemned.

Care Quality Commission inspectors found more ‘ligature risks’ there – and also criticised the unit’s lack of wheelchair facilities, and the lack of privacy in single sex accommodation.

It is deeply worrying that both of York’s main psychiatric units still fail to come up to standard.

Those with mental health difficulties are among the most vulnerable people in society. Yet they seem almost to be bottom of the heap when it comes to health care.

We know finances are tight. But health bosses have been talking about improving mental health care in York for far too long. It is time to do something, not just talk about it.