In response to a National Audit Office (NAO) report on the government’s New Hospital Programme (NHP), Sir Julian Hartley, chief executive of NHS Providers, said:

"Keeping patients and staff safe is critical to everything that the NHS does. High-quality care for patients requires safe, efficient and reliable buildings and equipment.

“Trusts will be concerned that the NAO has found that the government’s New Hospital Programme has not achieved good value for money so far.

“We agree with the NAO that delivery has been slower than expected. The costs of delayed NHP schemes have spiralled due to high inflation.  Many trusts in the NHP are deeply disappointed that their building plans won’t be delivered before 2030 and many more trusts were disappointed not to be offered funding at all.

“The government could have better managed expectations about the funding available, given the uncertainty involved and the impact of inflation.

“The government must future-proof new hospitals and care settings and heed the NAO’s warning that hospitals may be too small given high levels of bed occupancy. We must get this right. The government has also made ambitious assumptions about the scale of care that will be delivered in community settings in future.

"The government needs to shift gears and boost capital investment to overhaul ageing NHS estates. Many mental health, acute, community and ambulance services lack money for critical capital projects needed to offer modern and therapeutic care, and too many NHS buildings and facilities are falling apart.

“The eye-watering cost of trying to patch up creaking infrastructure and out-of-date facilities is mounting with a £10billion repairs bill across the NHS growing at an alarming rate.”