Revealed: the six trusts that need DH support with their PFI

The Department of Health commissioned consultants McKinsey in April to review which organisations needed PFI support. It has identified two trusts in London and four across the rest of the country.

They are: Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals; South London Healthcare; Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells; St Helens and Knowsley; Dartford and Gravesham; and North Cumbria University Hospitals trusts.

The findings mean other trusts – including Barts and the London, which has the largest PFI in the country – will probably have to obtain any outside support they require from primary care trust or strategic health authority clusters.

Other trusts with large unitary payments include Ports-mouth Hospitals and University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire.

The DH appointed McKinsey to examine the position of 22 hospital trusts which either had told the department their PFI would impede their progress to becoming a foundation trust, or where that was thought likely. It looked at trusts’ income and cost projections as well as examining their estates. The review also considered whether the PFI charge included non-estate costs like soft facilities management and how well the contract was managed.

The consultants were asked to put each of the organisations into one of three categories: those needing central support, those where a local solution was feasible and those where the problem was small enough not to require outside help.

The level of support required by the six trusts in the first category is not yet known but where deals are agreed they are expected to be signed off at the end of this financial year.

Treasury figures put the size of unitary payments the six trusts must make in 2012-13 at £184.7m, although it is not certain that they will receive this much from the DH. The six trusts have a combined turnover of £1.8bn, based on their 2010-11 outturn.

HSJ understands that the Treasury will demand to sign off the agreed amounts trust by trust.

The Dartford and North Cumbria deals were signed in 1997, and South London in 1998. Those for Barking, St Helens and Maidstone were agreed in 2004, 2006 and 2008.

The two London trusts among the six are already predicting a gross operating deficit for 2011-12.

Chancellor George Osborne last week announced a “fundamental reassessment” of PFI, with the aim of cutting costs and improving transparency.

The review will aim to create a new model for using private sector expertise to deliver public assets and services at a lower cost to the taxpayer, the Treasury said.