Chancellor announces plans for hundreds of health centres part-funded through ‘dynamic’ public-private partnerships model

Rachel Reeves has announced plans to build hundreds of ‘neighbourhood health centres’ which will be funded in part through a new public-private partnerships (PPP) model.

The chancellor, ahead of tomorrow’s Budget, announced 250 health “one stop shops” will be built as part of a new Neighbourhood Health Service that will provide “end-to-end care and tailored support”.

The Treasury in its announcement said construction of the centres will be delivered by a “dynamic new approach between the public and private sector, involving both repurposing current estate and new buildings”.

The funding will come through a combination of public investment and PPP model. The government said public investment will only be supplemented with private investment where it “provides value for money for the taxpayer”.  

PPPs, which were used extensively in the late 1990s and early 2000s, including through the Private Finance Initiative, are long-term collaborations where the private sector finances, builds, and often manages public infrastructure or services, while the government oversees and pays for performance.

Supporters of the model see it as an effective way of attracting private finance into public projects with less upfront cost to the government. But critics of the model have raised concerns over the long-term value for money of the projects to the taxpayer.

Building, through its Funding the Future initiative, earlier this year called on the government to radically expand its proposed use of public private partnerships to pay for social infrastructure in order to match the scale of the government’s stated ambitions.

The government said more than 100 health centres will be opened by 2030 including refurbishments to the Alfred Barrow Health Centre in Barrow-in-Furness, the Stockland Green and Summerfield Primary Care Centres in Birmingham and the Jubilee Gardens Centre in Ealing .

Reeves said: ”Our record investment, combined with ruthless efficiency and reform, will deliver the better care and better outcomes our NHS patients deserve.”

Karin Smyth, health minister, said: “We need to use every measure available to us, which is why we’re leveraging in private investment to construct some of these centres, making the most of all expertise and every tool at our disposal.”