Future Fit: Funding too ‘opaque’, claim councillors

Councillors from both of Shropshire’s local authorities say Future Fit should give more information on how plans will be funded, and how changes to primary and community care will work.

Members of the Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee said the public “are being asked to take a lot on trust” over the plans, which are due to go to consultation later this year.

The board was, at its last meeting, asked to give feedback on Future Fit’s pre-consultation business case, outlining its plans on how the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Princess Royal Hospital will provide services in the future.

Future Fit is proposing making Royal Shrewsbury Hospital home of the county’s main emergency centre, while Princess Royal Hospital will be the home of planned care.

But members of the board, which is comprised of representatives from both Telford & Wrekin Council and Shropshire Council says the public need to know more about how the project will be funded, before they have their say on the plans.

But David Evans, the man in charge of Future Fit, and Simon Wright, chief executive of the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the two hospitals says they are in a “chicken and egg” situation, where they will not know the public capital funding they can receive until the initial business case is approved by NHS England.

Mr Wright told a meeting of the committee, held at The Wakes in Oakengates yesterday, that they expected, if the proposals pass through the assurance process, to receive between £126 million to £150 million of capital funding.

However, Councillor Andy Burford, one of the joint chairmen of the committee, raised concerns that would leave a shortfall of between £161 million or £190 million to bring the plans to fruition.

Though Mr Evans said that details of this capital funding could be added into the public consultation documents later, he said details of how the remaining funds would still be worked on, and may be commercially sensitive.

Members of the committee, in their recommendations had also asked for more clarity on how community care would work alongside the plans.

In a bid to reduce hospital admissions, the plans outline an increase in care for people in the community.

But members said the plans did not explain enough about how it would work, or, again, financed.

Mr Evans told the meeting that hospital care is provided on a “tariff” basis, where payments are made per patient.

Any patients that don’t go into hospital, will mean funds that can instead be pointed into community or primary care.

Dr Julian Povey, chairman of Shropshire Clinical Commissioning Group said: “This consultation is about acute services.

“If this is approved, the plans will not be in place until 2020 to 2022, that is a long time for us to be able to work out the model for community care.”

Debbie Vogler, from Future Fit, added that this was only an initial business case, and once the final proposals are put together, likely in March, all issues will have to have been resolved.