The Government has recently announced a slew of extra funding for a range of NHS trusts through the Estates Safety Fund - a source of funding to address critical infrastructure and safety concerns in NHS hospital buildings.
Through this fund, Epsom and St Helier University Hospital NHS Trust will receive just over £12,000,000 in 2025-26 for essential work on building fabric and fittings, energy systems, ventilation systems, electrical systems and water systems. Several lifts will also be upgraded or replaced entirely. At the same time, £2,850,000 will be allocated to East Surrey Hospital for improvements to their energy systems.
Rebecca welcomes this funding and is particularly pleased that the Government has recognised the scale of the dilapidation and structural decay which Epsom and St Helier is grappling with as it tries to deliver healthcare out of buildings which are simply no longer fit for purpose. Knowing that many people, particularly in the north of the Reigate constituency, depend on Epsom and/or St Helier, Rebecca has seized every opportunity in Parliament to keep the needs of these hospitals high on the Government's agenda. In January she challenged the Secretary of State for Health over delays to the New Hospitals Programme while more recently in April she spoke in a parliamentary debate on hospitals to argue in favour of the delivery of a new state of the art Emergency Care Hospital in Sutton to ease pressure on Epsom and St Helier.
While it is pleasing that the Government has taken note of these interventions and allocated funds to address the unsustainable state of Epsom and St Helier, Rebecca is clear that this is ultimately just an interim measure. The buildings in question are now clearly at the end of their service lives and by seeking to keep them in operation, as opposed to look at an entirely new replacement, ministers are simply throwing money into a bottomless pit.
The real solution - and the one which Rebecca has advocated for at every opportunity since entering Parliament - is the immediate funding and rapid completion of the planned Emergency Care Hospital in Sutton. This project is fully mapped out, is agreed to be sure to improve clinical outcomes, and has the enthusiastic backing of Epsom and St Helier University Hospital NHS Trust. More to the point, investing into a new build now will surely be cheaper for the Treasury in the long run than yearly injections of £12,000,000 to keep the current estate barely serviceable!
Rebecca will continue to champion the Sutton scheme - a necessary means of ensuring that her constituents get access to the high quality, reliable healthcare to which they are entitled. Securing this funding is a very partial success towards that goal, but the real challenge is to get the Government to think long term!
