Speaking yesterday (23 July) in the House of Commons, Health Secretary Wes Streeting declared a desire to see the New Hospital Programme (NHP) completed but added he was not willing “to offer people false hope about how soon they will benefit from the facilities they deserve”.

He remarked, too, that the problems extended beyond the need to get the NHP back on a firm footing, noting that the whole NHS estate is currently in a poor condition. 

As well as responding to one Conservative MP by reassuring him that fixing hospitals with reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) are at the top of his priority list, he later added that “backlog maintenance, the direct cost of bringing the estate into compliance with mandatory fire safety requirements and statutory safety legislation, currently stands at £11.6 billion”.

In 2020, the Department of Health and Social Care estimated that it needed £3.7bn-£16bn of capital funding for the first four years of the NHP, and £19.8bn-£29.7bn for the full ten years to 2030, though HSJ reported in April 2023 that the cost was likely to be around £35bn. At the 2020 Spending Review, the Treasury initially allocated £3.7 billion for the four years to 2024-25.

The Treasury later suggested that maximum funding for 2025-26 to 2030-31 would be £18.5bn, subject to future spending reviews, bringing total funding to £22.bn. The scope of the NHP has since changed, notably with the discovery of hospitals built with now crumbling RAAC. Fixing such hospitals has been calculated at, on average, more than £1 billion per hospital. Eight NHP projects have also been delayed until after 2030, with additional funding likely to be needed at a later date.

At yesterday’s debate, Conservative MP Dr Caroline Johnson pressed Mr Streeting for a date on when the NHP review would be completed, arguing that the new Government was putting the programme at risk by launching the review and delaying building projects crucial to patient care. Defending the previous Government’s record, she pointed out that it had already opened six hospitals to patients, with two more due to open this financial year and 18 under construction. 

Lib Dems MP Daisy Cooper pointed to industry concerns that continuing with the “top-down, centralised approach” followed by the previous Government could “decimate competition in that industry, when we need a thriving industry to rebuild our hospitals and primary care”. 

She added: “We have the worst of all worlds at the moment: trusts such as mine in West Hertfordshire are champing at the bit to get going but cannot and are being held back. Other trusts have capital funds that they want to spend but are not allowed to because of outdated rules …”

Mr Streeting would not be drawn on the industry’s fears, as reported by Ms Cooper, but neither was he ready to let the Conservatives off the hook, referring to the previous health secretary (now shadow health secretary), Victoria Atkins, as knowing “exactly where the bodies are buried in the Department, where the unexploded bombs are, and exactly the degree to which [the NHP] timetable and the funding were not as set out by the previous Government”.