A £300,000 scheme designed to help members of the public complain about the NHS and social services is facing fresh criticism from county councillors.

Kent County Council’s Conservative administration has set out plans for Kent Health Watch, saying the initiative will provide a way for aggrieved patients and others to register their concerns about any aspect of their health care, including their treatment in hospital.

But backbench councillors who grilled public health chiefs about the plan on Wednesday have expressed misgivings and questioned why the scheme is necessary.

One senior Conservative said KCC risked opening a 'Pandora’s Box’ that would raise expectations among residents that the council could resolve their complaints about the NHS.

Cllr John Simmonds (Con) told a meeting of KCC’s policy scrutiny committee: "My anxiety is that we open a Pandora’s Box that may not deliver results. If we cannot deliver solutions [to patients’ concerns], will we be blamed? If all we are doing is looking at complaints and re-routeing them, I still need to be persuaded what its purpose is."

His concern was echoed by other councillors, who said some health trusts had expressed concerns about the idea, which will see complaints handled by a KCC call centre.

Cllr Roy Bullock (Con) said: "In some of my meetings with Primary Care Trusts, there is considerable concern about the interaction between Health Watch and other NHS services."

Meanwhile, opposition councillors said the scheme, which will run as a pilot for a year, would be a toothless watchdog and overlap with a national Government initiative to set up Local Involvement Networks (LINk) to monitor complaints about the NHS and social services.

But Graham Gibbens (Con), KCC’s cabinet member for public health, defended the idea. "There was no intention of duplicating other ways that complaints could be made," he said.

"Health Watch will give a clear means for individuals to make representations about their own or their friends observations and complaints about health care. What we are proposing is something that could be of massive benefit to the people of Kent."

Council officials say that an estimated £200,000 will be spent on employing seven staff to handle calls from members of the public and says it expects about 1,000 calls a month.