All articles by Alastair McLellan
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LeaderCSUs are dead, long live the SSU
The commissioning support unit (CSU) has had a strange history – it has also lasted much longer than your average non-hospital NHS organisation.
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NewsRevealed: The 10-Year Plan vision for FTs and ICBs
A new operating model proposed by the government’s 10-Year Health Plan will radically reform the role and governance of foundation trusts and integrated care boards.
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LeaderWe have seen the government’s 10-Year Health Plan: it is a mess
The latest draft of the government’s 10-Year Health Plan is based on weak assertions about funding, and fails to address the practicality of reform, says HSJ editor Alastair McLellan.
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LeaderThe NHS reformers must now prove their case
To visit the 2025 NHS ConfedExpo was like attending the kind of music festival which seeks to celebrate a previous decade – in this case, the first of this century
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NewsMackey’s men dominate the 2025 Top 50 CEO rankings
When Sir Jim Mackey took over as NHS England’s last chief executive, he picked four fellow acute trust CEOs to help him lead the service over the next two years.
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LeaderThe return of NICE
Amidst the state of permanent revolution which has afflicted the NHS in the 21st century, there has been one constant: the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence.
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NewsNew technology should be paid for ‘like medicines’, says NICE chief executive
The purchase of approved digital products and services used for diagnosing and treating NHS patients should be reimbursed centrally, the chief executive of the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence has told HSJ.
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LeaderStreeting is Lansley reborn
The government’s abandonment of its stricture against a top-down reorganisation would be breathtaking if it was not so tragic.
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LeaderWhat the abolition of NHSE means for the service’s leaders
A few hours after Sir Jim Mackey told trust CEOs that NHS England was to be abolished, its outgoing chair Richard Meddings held his leaving do in the same room.
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NewsMackey must be Streeting’s ‘chief adviser’, says ex-NHSE chief exec
It is essential new NHS England chief executive Sir Jim Mackey becomes the health secretary’s “chief policy adviser”, according to the only person to have run the service from the top of NHSE and within the Department of Health.
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LeaderPlanning round could be a ‘bloodbath’ without a change of course
Daniel Elkeles is to be congratulated on his appointment as the chief executive of NHS Providers. He has proved himself not only a successful CEO, but one who is prepared to speak truth to power and challenge conventional thinking. He is the right person for the job ahead.
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LeaderNHS England reaches a tipping point
The decline of NHS England’s power and influence has been a gradual, not sudden, affair. The direction of travel has been clear to most for at least three years, but HSJ contends the shift in the leadership of the service has, over the last few months, reached a tipping point. ...
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LeaderThe return of grown-up financial planning offers hope for 2025
The most pressing task facing NHS England and the service it oversees in the next three or four months will be to agree on a trust by trust, system by system financial and operational settlement that is both credible and acceptable to both parties and the government.
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NewsICB chairs made dames in New Year Honours
Two integrated care board chairs, one a former health secretary and the other a leading antiracism campaigner, have been made Dames in the 2025 New Year Honours.
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HSJ InteractiveDigital transformation will be key to ‘last chance’ NHS reforms
Two conflicting views wove through the HSJ and IBM event on how information technology might help deliver the forthcoming 10-year NHS plan.
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NewsTrust ‘support and admin staff’ targeted for cuts in 2025-26 by NHSE
NHS England will hold discussions with every trust about the potential for cutting of its non-clinical workforce early next year.
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LeaderThe return of austerity to the NHS means making tough choices
The implications of last month’s budget are now being fully understood throughout the NHS – and the conclusion of leaders at all levels is that austerity will return to the service for 2025-26.
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LeaderNot having a row about failing managers
There are many better things Wes Streeting could focus on than picking rows with NHS managers, writes HSJ editor Alastair McLellan.
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NewsNHSE desire to please govt forcing finance chiefs to agree undeliverable plans
One of the NHS’s foremost finance figures has joined the chorus of senior healthcare leaders raising serious concerns about the damaging effect of the way the service’s annual planning round is conducted.
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LeaderMental health is not a priority for this government
This government is fond of declaring it is committed to “three shifts” in health and care policy: hospital to community, analogue to prevention, and treatment to prevention.