Responding to the Prime Minister's NHS winter funding announcement, deputy chief executive Saffron Cordery said:

"Any financial support to prepare for and manage winter is welcome and this is never more the case than this year – the most challenging in the NHS' history.

"Every year trusts stress the need to be able to plan as early as possible and certainty about this funding will obviously help.

"Trusts are facing a triple whammy of pressures: winter itself, including the prospect of flu, the ongoing pandemic and possible second surge, and trying to recover their position and restart ‘usual services’ across the service. They are doing all of this in new and very challenging circumstances.

"Trust leaders will need urgent clarity about what this £3bn will cover and whether or not it is all new money. Nightingale hospitals and independent sector capacity is already in place, so while helpful, will maintain current capacity.

"Trusts need more than that. They have got to recover the lost ground of the last four or five months and put measures in place to manage the additional activity that always happens in winter.

"It is also not clear if this funding will extend to mental health, community, rehab and ITU capacity. This all needs to be in place to ensure that the whole NHS system can effectively manage the winter period and restarting of services.

"Also trusts and their local partners need the capacity to 'lock in' the astonishing level of innovation and transformation delivered at speed since March. These should bring lasting benefits.

"Sadly what we do know won't be included is social care.

"Social care across the country is in a critical condition and the government has still failed to commit to providing the sector with the funding it needs to be fully sustainable. A thriving social care and NHS go hand in hand."