RAAC-affected hospitals and supporting people with frailty scrutinised in two-part PAC session with health officials
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) will investigate the New Hospital Programme update and Supporting people with frailty outside hospitals in a two-part evidence session with witnesses from the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England at 3.30pm on Monday, 9February.
Meeting details
In 2025, the government committed to delivering all 46 hospital schemes proposed under the revised New Hospital Programme. This would involve replacing seven hospitals built from reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC), which a report had recommended should be replaced by 2030. By 2025 RAAC hospitals had required ?500mn investment to mitigate the most significant risks, a figure which is likely to increase if the 2030 deadline is not met.
A report from the National Audit Office (NAO) found the scheme, revised by the current government, could cost around 50% more than first reported in 2023, with the government setting aside a total of ?60bn funding, a ?33.8bn increase from 2023. During this session, MPs may consider how realistic the revised scheme is, and the potential disruptions resulting from the merging of NHS England into the DHSC. The Committee could explore the reasons behind delays for the design of advanced hospitals, following concerns that proposed designs may be more expensive to run than existing hospitals.
More than one in ten people over the age of 65 and up to half the population aged over 85 live with frailty. In 2019, researchers estimated that frailty was costing the UK healthcare system around ?5.8 billion per year, a figure which is likely to increase with an aging population. Levels of frailty are not equally spread across the population with women more prone to frailty than men, and lower socio-economic groups are more likely to develop frailty at a younger age.
A recent report from the NAO found that there were serious discrepancies across the NHS in the diagnosis of frailty and the support offered. 32 of 106 NHS local areas assessed less than 10% of their registered patients aged 65 or over, and nine areas assessed over 90%. The Committee will investigate these significant and unexplained local variations and examine the challenges GPs face in diagnosing and supporting patients. The accountability of ensuring patients with frailty are identified and supported could also be explored.