Accountable officer will be appointed in time to lead new NHS group from next month, health boss says

Shropshire Clinical Commissioning Group and Telford & Wrekin CCG will be dissolved for the new single organisation to be formed on April 1.

However, the current joint accountable officer David Evans and chair Dr Julian Povey will not be at the helm.

Mr Evans has announced he will be joining Midlands and Lancashire Commissioning Support Unit as projects director while Dr Povey will go back to focusing on his GP work, making way for the new chair Dr John Pepper.

Dr Povey, on behalf of the CCGs’ governing bodies, is currently leading the search for a new accountable officer to replace Mr Evans.

Although it is less than a month from when the change happens, he says he is confident a new accountable officer will be appointed in time.

Dr Povey said: "Legally we have to have an accountable officer so we will have an accountable officer on April 1.

"It's a key role. Moving forward, if the white paper goes through CCGs are going to be abolished in a year and the majority of their functions will come into the integrated care system (ICS) so the commissioning arena is the place that is still going to be needed to be held and it's going to need to be looked after and someone has to be leading that role within the CCG then into the ICS, so they are key positions moving forward."

Reflecting on his time with the CCGs, Dr Povey said: "I'm going back to being a full time GP.

"It's the right time for me to return to practice. My practice is merging with another practice next door, Pontesbury and Worthen.

"I've made some tremendous friendships and done some tremendous things over the last number of years.

"I'll miss working with the people in the CCG on a daily basis but I'll still be part of the healthcare system.

"I'm very proud what we have done as an organisation and of the people I work with."

Mr Evans added: "I've been in the system quite a long time and I've seen a lot of progress we've made over that time.

"We've had a lot of challenges over that time.

"I've worked with a fantastic group of people in both CCGs. "There are a number of achievements that I'm incredibly proud of. I think if someone had said to us four years ago we were going to merge the CCGs by now, everyone would have said that's never going to happen in our lifetime, and yet we managed to achieve that.

"We've demonstrated through the pandemic and particularly with the vaccination programme how well we can get the system to work together.

"We've got Future Fit in terms of the £312m capital which is there for that. That's a significant achievement.

"We've certainly had some challenges, not least the money and we all recognise that.

"I think with a new organisation it's the right time to hand over to someone else."

The plans to form a single CCG for the county were approved last year by NHS chiefs.

Bosses said working as two CCGs had led to "duplication and inconsistency".