Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he has taken to acquire further funding for the rebuilding of the Royal Lancaster Infirmary.

The New Hospital Programme: plan for implementation was published on 20 January 2025 and sets out a credible, deliverable plan for the schemes in the New Hospital Programme (NHP). This plan will be delivered through five-year waves of investment and is backed by up to £15 billion over each consecutive five-year wave, averaging £3 billion a year from 2030. Further information on the plan for implementation is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/new-hospital-programme-review-outcome

As wave 3 schemes, the Royal Lancaster Infirmary and the Royal Preston Hospital have been paused. No further funding will be available from the NHP until pre-construction activity begins from 2030. The NHP is committed to ensuring both schemes are fully resourced when this time comes. The standard process for confirming the total funding amount for major infrastructure projects involves the review and approval of a Full Business Case. All trusts in the programme have previously received indicative funding allocations to support planning, however these are commercially sensitive.

An equality impact assessment was carried out for the review into the NHP and included assessing the extent to which service users might be impacted by these delivery proposals, with specific reference to the impact that these might have on relevant protected characteristics. This was laid in the House Library and published on 20 January 2025, and is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/new-hospital-programme-review-outcome/new-hospital-programme-equality-impact-assessment