Following reports this week that there have been further delays in the delivery of the £29m capital funding for the Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, Rachel Maclean, MP for Redditch, sought clarity from Minister of State for Health Philip Dunne yesterday (Tuesday).
Rachel said: “The Minister confirmed to me that there had been no ‘further delay’, because the process involved in delivering this money is a complex one and in fact no timescales had yet been given.
“One of the things I have learned, and become frustrated about, is that as this money is part of a much larger national STP capital funding programme, it was always going to take an extended time for due processes to take place and a full business case to be drawn up.
“No timescales were given in the first place, so to say there have been further delays is simply not true. The good news though is that only yesterday the Minister confirmed in the House that the Department of Health had concluded its analysis of the outline business case for the £29 million allocated in July, and that it has been approved. There are further processes to be completed, but this is nothing that was not already known about.
“I am also aware the Trust is fully engaged with NHS Improvement and the Department of Health to explore all the options for funding going forward that will enable them to start the project as soon as possible. This will ultimately be good news for the people of Redditch.”
