FUNDRAISERS are angry after discovering the £4-million dedicated children's unit they raised money for will be closed and moved across Bristol at five times the cost.

The Barbara Russell Unit opened in 2000 after the successful Jack and Jill fundraising appeal, but is due to close in 2014 when the rest of the Frenchay site is downgraded to a community hospital, leaving campaigners furious, with one group even asking for their money back.

Paediatric burns and neurosurgery will move to Bristol Children's Hospital as part of plans to centralise all specialist treatment for youngsters on one site. But because there is not enough room to accommodate the additional staff and patients, the paediatric services from Frenchay will be housed in a new ward block that is yet to be built.

The Jack and Jill Appeal campaign director, Bob Woodward, who also founded cancer charity Clic in 1976, says he feels let down by the NHS for closing the unit that he, and others, worked tirelessly for.

He is also chief executive of the Starfish Foundation, formed by Charlie and Mary Dobson, who granted £1 million towards the unit. The charitable foundation tried without success to reclaim the money donated to the appeal when they found out that the children's ward was going to close and has vowed not to support NHS projects in the future.

Mr Woodward, of Frenchay, said: "When I was asked to take on the voluntary role of campaign director I was assured that this was a 'once in a lifetime opportunity to build the best possible unit to care for children well into the 21st century'.

"Yet, within a couple of years of its completion, plans had been drawn up to clear the site. We have all been badly let down and we just feel as if we have been used."

Mr Woodward said no one from the NHS trusts in Bristol took the time to explain the decision to close the Barbara Russell unit.

Mr Woodward is also upset the Paul O'Gorman Lifeline Building at Southmead Hospital, which he helped to raise funds for, has been demolished to make way for the new superhospital.

Bristol University paid back £2 million raised after an appeal for the charity Children with Leukaemia because they could not use the building for the purposes the money had been made available.

North Bristol NHS Trust, which runs Frenchay and Southmead hospitals, said there is no provision for money to be paid back to fundraisers and no donations have been returned.

They said that by 2014 more than 30,000 children will have benefited from treatment at the Barbara Russell Unit and that it is not viable to keep the ward open when the other major hospital services are no longer available on the site.

Chief executive Ruth Brunt said: "North Bristol NHS Trust is incredibly grateful to Mr Woodward and everyone who raised funds to build the Barbara Russell Unit in the late 1990s.

"The expertise that has been developed here at Frenchay will not be lost. The unit will simply transfer to the centre of Bristol into a brand new, purpose-built facility."

It is not yet known whether the children's unit will be retained as part of the Frenchay community hospital as work on the arrangement of the site is ongoing.