ROOKSDOWN residents braved the wind and rain to vent their frustrations at the continued delay to build a GP surgery in the area.

The original application to build the surgery in Park Prewett Road will be three-years-old in June, yet still there is no signs of any construction work starting.

Currently residents who wish to see their local doctor have to wait in a temporary porter cabin, with cramped conditions and with more than a month wait for an appointment.

Residents and local councillors today stood outside the temporary surgery to ‘celebrate’ the anniversary since the application was granted, holding placards reading ‘Sick of waiting for Rooksdown surgery.’

Ward councillor, Cllr Simon Bound and Hampshire County Councillor for Basingstoke North West, Cllr Stephan Reid even took a birthday cake down to the site as a sarcastic gesture.

Michael Auerbach, 66, who has lived in Rooksdown for seven years said the wait time is frustrating but also the lack of doctors who work there.

He said: “They have had issues recruiting GPs, as the working conditions aren’t ideal and it is not good for people who want to see a local GP if the doctors are changing all the time.

“There is a really good community being built here, that wants to have a local surgery to go into and not have to wait a month for an appointment.”

Cllr Bound told The Gazette that when the application was first granted, there was a window for the work to be complete, now that window has passed.

He said: “We have other infrastructure which is coming into the area, and if they all want different compounds it is going to cause chaos in Rooksdown.

“We have even heard from the hospital thinking the surgery is closed as people have been going to A&E because they cannot get an appointment.

“At the moment we don’t even have a date as to when the work is going to start and with the application being extended we don’t want to be in the same situation in three years’ time.”