£1M hospital work starts in thre Spring

But vitally-needed expansion and modernisation of the hospital's Irvine Unit will cost the charity founded in the Spring of 1952 1.175m.

It will mean that for the immediate future the league will, in relative terms, have to count the pennies.

Generous bequests from former patients have given the league the ability to invest ever-increasing sums in recent years in schemes benefiting local patients.

Major projects in conjunction with Hastings and Rother NHS Trust have included the Jethro Arscott Day Surgery Unit, Bexhill Health Centre and a previous Irvine Unit improvement.

Well in advance of golden jubilee year, the league had asked the Trust to identify a major scheme that the league could undertake. The league had set aside 890,000 but the scheme was modified in the light of Trust investigations - notably to include a bigger lift so beds can be moved.

Bexhill and Rother Primary Care Trust, which is based at Bexhill Hospital, will take over responsibility for the Irvine Unit - and therefore the project - in April.

Treasurer Robin Barnett told the league committee meeting that the charity has 1.8m.

Projects already approved for which the bills have not yet arrived account for a further 291,000.

With other hospital requests still in the pipeline it looks like the league could soon be down to its last 267,000.

Legacies are the league's biggest sources of income and have been running at record levels for several years.

But they cannot be predicted and are subject to wild swings of fortune.

By this time last year 100,000 had been received. Legacies received since January 1 this year total 4,225.

The treasurer warned the committee: "It means that we cannot sit at meetings in the future and spend money as we have until we see what legacies are coming in..."