North Manchester General the big winner as govt sets timeline
Along with Cheshire’s RAAC-affected Leighton Hospital, the rebuild of the Crumpsall estate is included in wave one of the New Hospitals Programme’s delivery timetable – but Preston and Lancaster must wait until 2035.
Attacking what was originally promoted as a £20bn programme, dismissed last week as “unachievable” by the Infrastructure Projects Authority, the government has now mapped out delivery across 15 years.
The government said that “the new plan, which is affordable and honest, will be backed with £15bn of new investment over consecutive five-year waves, averaging £3bn a year”.
Setting aside ‘wave zero’ projects already on site, wave one of the New Hospitals Programme marks the priority projects, which are advanced enough in preparation and/or have an urgent enough need that time is of the essence.
Wave one projects cover those with a target start date between 2025 and 2030. Both North Manchester General and Leighton’s upgrade programmes are inked in for a start in 2027 or 20228, with both budgeted at a cost of £1bn to £1.5bn.
Although in Yorkshire, Airedale General Hospital also serves part of East Lancashire, and is also included in wave one.
In a joint statement, Mark Cubbon, chief executive of Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, and Cllr Bev Craig, Leader of Manchester City council, said:
“This is fantastic news for all the patients who rely on North Manchester General Hospital and all the dedicated staff who work there. We wholeheartedly welcome the Government’s certainty and commitment around the future of North Manchester General Hospital and its plans for a full rebuild.
“The Secretary of State has suggested that the start date could be as early as 2027/28. Everyone involved has worked so hard already to progress the enabling works on site, meaning that we are virtually ‘shovel ready’.”
Pieces of work to underpin the main development phase at the 67-acre Crumpsall estate have been ongoing for some time, including a 964-space car park delivered in 2023 by Morgan Sindall Construction, part of a £36.5m programme of enabling works.
Plans to demolish Park House at the site have been lodged this year.
Cubbon and Cllr Craig went on to say “This scheme is bigger than just a hospital, it is an exciting plan for how we develop civic-led healthcare regeneration.
“The green light is a massive boost for the North Manchester Strategy, the largest urban redevelopment programme in the North of England. Working together with our communities, we will ensure that the new North Manchester General Hospital does not just provide excellent healthcare but also improves the health and quality of life for the communities which it serves.”
With projects already through planning and those with RAAC issues being bumped up the list, the projects at Royal Lancaster and Royal Preston were already known to be further down the pipeline, but have missed out on the second wave of schemes – those pencilled in for a start between 2030 and 2035.
Both are in wave three. Lancaster has a rough start date of 2035 to 2038 and an estimated cost of £1bn to £1.5bn, with Preston set for 2037 to 2039 and £2bn.
Both proposals, as reported in December, are for new-builds on wholly new sites, with the NHS securing a 94-acre plot at Bailrigg last year, close to the university. The new Royal Preston Hospital is eamrakred for a site close to Farington.
Wes Streeting, health and social care secretary, said: “The New Hospital Programme we inherited was unfunded and undeliverable. Not a single new hospital was built in the past five years, and there was no credible funding plan to build forty in the next five years.
“When I walked into the Department of Health and Social Care, I was told that the funding for the New Hospitals Programme runs out in March. We were determined to put the programme on a firm footing, so we can build the new hospitals our NHS needs.
“Today we are setting out an honest, funded, and deliverable programme to rebuild our NHS.”
Hopefully for Preston and Lancaster the design work and planning applications will take place prior to 2035 to prevent the start date being delayed even further.
I do think it is short sighted to push the starts back so far considering the current condition of both hospitals but few people really believed that the timescale was realistic for the 40 ‘new’ hospitals. Just another Johnson lie.
By Dom
Do those Lancaster and Preston start dates take into account the fact that there are consultations open on moving both of those hospital sites elsewhere (which presumably removes the need to remediate the RAAC)?
By Salfordian
Oh no..even more more money being thrown at Manchester ! I’m swimming in it I can’t see for pound notes😅
By Not Jeff