To receive an update on the site selection process for the new Frimley Park Hospital. Please note: presenters will not be able to provide information on the preferred sites in this meeting.
Minutes:
Cain Thomas, Interim Programme Director for the new Frimley Park Hospital and Robyn Jarrett, Assistant Director of Engagement at Frimley Health presented an update on the site selection progress for the new hospital.
The new government had recently announced a full review of the new national hospital programme, however while the review was underway, priority hospitals with RAAC would continue to be delivered, including Frimley Park.
Around 65% of the hospital building was built with RAAC, which was deteriorating. Since 2019, extensive work had been undertaken to keep the hospital safe for staff and patients to a total cost of £30m by the end of this financial year. High-risk areas such as ICU and operating theatres had already been dealt with, and paediatric wards were being completed in the Autumn. Operational continuity would be ensured while building the new hospital.
The new hospital on the new site would be in excess of 130,000sqm, and would cost over £1 billion to build. The new hospital was required to be ready for 2030. Health colleagues were working to determine the number of inpatient and community beds which would be required to support the new hospital.
The site selection process had begun in Summer 2023 when a land agent had been engaged to look for possible sites. The long list of sites had been appraised, alongside an engagement exercise with staff, patients and the community on what was important to them. The preferred sites were now being assessed against particular criteria, and the key risks and opportunities on each site had been identified. Local planning and highways authorities had been engaged on the preferred sites. The preferred sites remained confidential while existing land use was assessed.
The next steps for the process would be to further develop the equalities impact assessment on each site, and to undertake further ecological and environmental work on the preferred sites.
In response to questions, the following points were noted:
· While an indicative timeline was being followed, it was not possible to confirm how long the site selection process would take.
· The project was currently at the land purchasing stage and not yet considering design for the new hospital.
· While the significant areas of the hospital had been addressed, there remained a significant amount of remedial work to undertake.
· It was clarified that RAAC schemes were exempt from the review being undertaken by the government.
Robyn advised Board members of the engagement work which was being undertaken. Health colleagues were committed to engaging with staff, patients, volunteers and communities and had developed equality and inclusion principles to gather the views of under-represented communities. Healthwatch colleagues were supporting with co-design work and were having conversations with communities with English as Additional Language, patients with additional communication requirements, carers, and service users in deprived areas. All the output of this work would feed into a communications and engagement programme and had fed into the site selection process for the priority sites.
The site selection process had also taken account of the current workforce needs, and several engagement initiatives were underway to encourage staff to have their say on the requirements of a new hospital.
In response to a question, it was noted that a discussion needed to be had about out-of-hospital work, to ensure that the hospital only treated the patients who needed to be there. It was also noted that in addition to Frimley Healthcare Foundation Trust staff, other NHS staff across the system (ICB and providers) had expressed an interest in being more informed about the new hospital build programme.
The Board thanked Cain and Robyn for their presentation.
Supporting documents: