The Government’s £100 million funding package for end-of-life care in England has been greeted with caution by the boss of a hospice.

The announcement includes an extra £26 million for children’s hospices, but Gareth Pierce, chief executive of Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice in Huddersfield, said that while he welcomed a longer-term solution term was still necessary.

The hospice launched a public appeal after revealing a £1m funding gap could lead to 16 staff losing their jobs and a reduction in services at the start of December.

The Government said it was the “biggest investment in a generation”, but Mr Pierce said this did not change the need to continue fundraising.

Funding comes after hospice leaders have been notified they had to close beds due to increasing financial pressures.

Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice offers services such as short breaks, respite care and end-of-life symptom management as well as a range of therapies for children and their families.

She gets around 10% of her annual income – or just over £500,000 – from statutory funding.

With annual running costs of £6 million, the rest must come from fundraising appeals and donations.

Mr Pierce said they wanted to protect “these vital services that families desperately need” but warned that if long-term support was not provided then they would have to consider cutting costs.

He also warned they faced a “perfect storm”: uncertainty of future statutory funding, “a really difficult revenue climate” and rising costs.

Mr Pierce said it was “a huge step forward that the Government had listened to the concerns of not only children’s hospices but also adult hospices”.

But he added that he wanted to know when discussions on longer-term funding would take place, warning that wage and other core costs had continued to rise by around £500,000 a year.

“It made it incredibly difficult for us to continue to raise the same amount of money just to keep the doors open,” he said.

The hospice’s appeal was also backed by the father of a terminally ill boy, who pleaded with the government to give them more support.

Steve Lord, whose 10-year-old son Ethan suffers from a life-threatening brain disease, said the prospect to no longer have the support of the hospice was “scary”.

In England, around 170 hospices provide end-of-life care for adults and around 40 provide palliative care for children and young people, with some hospices providing care for both.

The government said the funding was “the biggest investment in a generation” and would be used to improve buildings, equipment and housing.

Health and Social Care Secretary Wes Streeting said hospices provided care and support to patients and their families in the “most difficult of times”.

“It is right that they receive the financial support necessary to provide these services.”

Details of the announced program will be shared with the palliative care sector in the new year.

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