REDCAR and Cleveland Borough Council has voiced concerns that the Strategic Health Authority (SHA) could undermine the Government's plans for a borough-wide primary care trust.

A motion, which received unanimous support, is expressing alarm over suggestions that the SHA may impose another management tier.

Councillor Valerie Halton, the council's cabinet member for health and social services, is urging Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt to intervene.

She said: "We know what the people in the borough want, because it's our job to listen to them. And it's right for us to fight for what we thought we had gained."

The motion, which is also being sent to SHA chief executive David Flory, says: "This council welcomes the decision of the Government to set up a Redcar and Cleveland Primary Care Trust (PCT).

"We believe this will benefit public service and clinical engagement through the integration of public services and in reducing overheads through shared services between primary care trusts and councils.

"We are alarmed at suggestions that the Strategic Health Authority, without consultation, may be about to impose a single management team and a professional executive committee across Teesside.

"We call on the Secretary of State to intervene, to ensure that effective consultation on management structures and shared services takes place and prevent the imposition of a single management team and professional executive committee."

The action backs up another motion, passed with unanimous support in March, which urged the SHA to create a borough-wide primary care trust in a bid to prevent closure of the area's two PCTs in favour of a Teesside-wide authority.

It called for the establishment of a PCT that would combine Langbaurgh and the Eston part of Middlesbrough, to work with the Redcar and Cleveland Local Strategic Partnership in delivering agreed health and social care priorities.