THE appointment this week of a £90,000-a- year regional health authority communications director has enraged the Save the Royal Surrey Campaign, which believes the post has been created to "sell" cuts and closure plans. The controversial engagement by the South East Coast Strategic Health Authority of what is seen as "a spin doctor" comes at a time when the SHA is threatening to slash health services in Surrey, complained campaign chairman Professor Chris Mark. The SHA advertised the post in the run up to Christmas and the matter was raised in a health debate in the Commons in December by Arundel and South Downs MP Nick Herbert. He saw the role as being established for "propagandising" and delivering information to the Ministerial Briefing Unit. The Save the Royal Surrey Campaign this week said its communications advice to the authority comes free. "Local people don't need spin doctors, they need the real doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals who are delivering high quality healthcare in their local hospital." And Prof Marks complained: "The authority is currently claiming that its financial position is so precarious that it needs to cut services, and is considering closing hospitals including the Royal Surrey in Guildford. "£90,000 would pay for around 13 coronary bypasses, or more than 120 hernia operations." However, this assertion was repudiated by an SHA spokesman, who told The Herald that all the strategic health authorities were appointing communications directors and the salary level is nationally set. "It doesn't come out of money which is allocated by the government for each primary care trust. There is not actually a question of less happening on account of it. There is a funding formula." A press release stated: "The NHS is publicly accountable and has a duty to engage effectively with its patients and their families, its staff and all its partner organisations." The position has gone to Stephanie Hood, who will take up the post at the beginning of March. Currently at the Department of Health, she has led communications for national consultations about patient choice and the NHS Plan, has worked in an acute NHS trust, with the pharmaceutical industry and for the NHS executive. The controversy has come amid concerns over plans for further cuts to the number of NHS staff, revealed last week in a leaked Department of Health document. According to the workforce planning document, the NHS will have to cut a further 37,000 jobs and close hospital services across the UK this year to try to reduce its level of financial deficit.  It warned that the NHS workforce would have to be decreased by 2.7 per cent in order to restore "financial balance" - almost twice as many as previously predicted. Commenting on the situation, South-West Surrey MP Jeremy Hunt said: "Labour's disastrous financial mismanagement of the health service has hit local residents hard.  "Financial deficits were behind the proposals to shut local hospitals such as in Milford, Cranleigh and Haslemere and are the reason that the Royal Surrey County Hospital now faces closures.  "Poor management by the government cannot be allowed to impact on the level of local healthcare provision, which is why we must continue to fight against the threat to health services in Surrey and to save the Royal Surrey County Hospital." Mr Hunt said possible hospital closures are far and away the biggest worries of his constituents in South West Surrey. Last year the MP set out his "10 Ideas for South-West Surrey" then launched a constituency-wide survey to find out which issues local people considered most important to them and their community. He received a considerable response to the survey – more than 6,000 - both by mail and through his website and said he now plans to use the findings to determine his priorities for 2007. The results of the survey showed that 31 per cent of constituents think that Mr Hunt's top priority should be fighting hospital closures, 20 per cent think it should be improving traffic management and 12 per cent believe that it should be fighting against overdevelopment. He said: "The results of the survey are clear. People in south-west Surrey are most concerned about hospitals, traffic and overdevelopment - but with possible hospital closures at the Royal Surrey, Milford and Haslemere far and away the biggest worries. "Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond - I will certainly use your comments to guide my campaigning." On hospitals, constituents agreed that NHS reductions would have a detrimental impact on healthcare in South West Surrey.  Ninety five per cent said that it was vital to retain an A&E unit at the Royal Surrey County Hospital, 83 per cent thought that the decision to close Milford Hospital would be detrimental to rehabilitation services and 84 per cent said that Haslemere was a vital community hospital and should be expanded. Regarding traffic management, 74 per cent of respondents believed that Farnham needed an integrated traffic plan and 78 per cent thought that south-west Surrey's villages were being ruined by traffic and that there needed to be further investment in better traffic management. In addition, 92 per cent agreed with Mr Hunt that there needed to be a balanced approach to development, but not the "garden grabbing" that destroyed the special character of the local area. He said many constituents also backed his mobile phone masts, quarry threats and "save our nurseries" campaigns. With a successful outcome in prospect to the A3 tunnel saga, he said he will continue to put pressure on the highways authority to ensure that it is completed by 2012.