Editor's comment: Time to fix the healthcare blues

Editor's comment: Time to fix the healthcare blues

Reviews of public procurement programmes are occasionally necessary, sometimes useful, but often deeply frustrating for the private sector.

The current Department of Health (DH) review of the major acute PFI hospital programme is a case in point.

The private sector is increasingly concerned at the delays the review is causing at every stage of the PFI process. The £300m Maidstone & Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust scheme is the only project in England at shortlist stage. The South Devon Healthcare NHS Trust scheme is the only project at OJEU stage and that is now hugely delayed. Of the 15 major projects announced by the then healthcare secretary John Reid on 27 July 2004 there is not a sign. There is nothing in the pipeline to bid for.

Not only that, various projects at preferred bidder stage are being subject to reviews that often end up in drastic revisions, as our story on the Leicester and North Staffordshire schemes shows.

As if that wasn’t enough, the ProCure 21 programme is in the doldrums and the NHS LIFT Wave 4 programme is bogged down in contractual negotiations and cash worries among primary care trusts.

The government promised to avoid releasing projects in a feast/famine style by providing a continuous flow, but the tap has been turned right off as far as healthcare is concerned.

Without some reasonable indication of future workload, it makes it very difficult for private sector bidders to justify keeping expensive and skilled PFI teams together. It is also incredibly expensive for consortia facing lengthy reviews at preferred bidder stage, as their costs rocket with every day’s delay.

The DH must provide some clarity on the future healthcare programme and soon. It’s not just industry that suffers, but the public who need modern healthcare facilities urgently.

James Atkinson, deputy editor, Contract Journal, 12 July 2006