Commenting on recent reports in the national media about private providers bidding the UK government for money to build new facilities for NHS use, Nuffield Trust Senior Policy Analyst Sally Gainsbury said:
“The private sector’s ability to make a significant dent in the NHS waiting list has been limited because it lacks intensive care facilities, meaning private hospitals generally can’t care for patients with serious and complicated illness. Private hospitals are also disproportionately located in the South East, not all across England.
“These reported proposals – submitted to the Treasury by the Independent Healthcare Providers Network – appear to add up to a bid for the government to pay private firms to borrow money from the banks, which they can then invest in building new hospitals, intensive care units, and in recruiting new clinical staff. This begs the question why the government wouldn’t just borrow that money itself, at a far cheaper rate than the private sector can, and add the required capacity to the NHS.
“The NHS needs to think carefully about the benefits of paying the private sector to use its buildings and equipment, and think even harder about the merits of paying the private sector to develop new facilities instead of adding those directly to the NHS. We have seen plenty of instances where these initiatives have cost a great deal of public money for a limited return.”