Angela Blair, mother of five-year-old leukaemia patient Lewis Blair, of South Queensferry: "The Sick Kids becomes your life. There are more than two major cities in Scotland and the number of children in the Sick Kids when we were th
ere suggested a facility is needed there and in Glasgow too."
Dr David Barr, a former consultant paediatrician at the Sick Kids: "The Sick Kids takes children, not just from Edinburgh, but from the Lothians, Fife and the Borders. For them there are medical issues with travelling to Glasgow for specialist care. Just screening and testing - if that's all that the Sick Kids is going to be in the future - it's disastrous and calamitous."
East Lothian Labour MSP
Iain Gray: "It would seem perverse if a new children's hospital (being planned for Little France to replace the current Sick Kids] provided fewer services than the existing one."
Valerie Simpson, managing director and founder of Children with Cancer and Leukaemia Advice and Support for Parents (CCLASP): "The last thing we want to do is stop the service. People are always saying they don't know how they would manage without us. But if we were taking more children to Glasgow, we would have to consider our future."
Edinburgh Pentlands Conservative MSP
David McLetchie: "We need specialist centres plural and the present situation of one in the west, one in the east, and one in the north, seems reasonable. To concentrate on one area would be centralisation gone mad."
Margaret Watt, of the Scottish Patients Association: "We are supposed to be increasing the amount of support available to children with cancer, why are we cutting back?"
Emergency motion unanimously backed by
56 Edinburgh city councillors, from the Lib Dems, SNP, Labour, Tories and Greens: "The option of the downgrading of paediatric cancer and neurology at the Sick Kids in Edinburgh is unacceptable and this council should work with campaigners to keep these vital services in Edinburgh."
Councillor
Steve Cardownie, deputy leader of the city council and SNP group leader: "I have had cause to take my wee boy to the Sick Kids on several occasions, and it is great to know these facilities are on our doorstep. We should do everything we can to keep services in Edinburgh. The council will officially be informing the Scottish Government of our position, but (the SNP group] will also contact our colleagues and use every avenue we can to influence matters."
Mike Pringle, Lib Dem MSP for Edinburgh South: "The idea of putting all the kids with cancer in one place is crazy. It's not an area where we should look to save money."
Jenny Harrison, of Penicuik, whose daughter Kirsty, now 17, has been treated for a brain tumour at the Sick Kids: "We were very lucky that Kirsty could be treated at the Sick Kids. I am concerned about the families who have to go through what we've done having to go to Glasgow, where the children will not get as many visitors."
Lothians Labour MSP
George Foulkes: "I think it's unfortunate that some consultants keep pushing this idea of centralisation, because they think it is best from their point of view. From the patients' and parents' point of view it is entirely the wrong thing to do."
Child Brain Injury Trust spokesman: "Associated Brain Injury is the number one cause of death and disability in young people. Yet, here in Scotland, the emphasis seems to be on reducing rather than improving services."
