'Huge disappointment' for NHS bosses as work on controversial Shrewsbury health hub project paused amid funding blow

The proposed Shrewsbury Health and Wellbeing Hub received a backlash from many residents, who had concerns about having to travel further to see a medic and not being able to have a regular GP.

Now NHS Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin Integrated Care Board (ICB) has announced it is pausing work on the project. It comes after six "Cavell Centre" health hub projects in the country, including in Shrewsbury, were put on hold by NHS England in March due to a lack of funding.

Dr Nick White, chief medical officer at the ICB said: "NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin has reluctantly taken the decision to pause work on the Shrewsbury Health and Wellbeing Hub.

"In January 2023, NHS England issued a letter to NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin which instructed that the national Cavell Centre Programme, locally known as the Shrewsbury Health and Wellbeing Hub, and its constituent six pilot programmes, should be paused pending approval of the national business case.

"Since then, we have received no further communication of when the business case will be going forward for approval. We are also aware that even if the business case did go forwards, there are still no guarantees that the capital funding would be made available in the current economic climate.

"Given that indications now point to the pause being medium to long term, NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin has reluctantly taken the decision to pause all further work and expenditure at this point.

"It is important to clarify that this is a national directive for all six pilot programmes, and that the local projects as part of the Cavell Centre Programme cannot influence the decision.

"This is a hugely disappointing position given the significant amount of work that has been undertaken and the very clear case for change. This does pose an extremely challenging situation to our practices if we are not able to access the £40-£60m national capital allocation for the programme. Currently, there is no mechanism for securing this level of funding which means we now need to plan for an alternative future.

"We will of course do all we can to avoid practice closures, but we will need to consider the consequences of practices that may no longer be able to continue to provide services, and as a result hand back their contract.

"We are now in discussions with the six practices about next steps and revisiting each practice individually to explore what could be achieved to support them going forward. However, it is important to note that this will be to stabilise the practices as best we can and not about future-proofing or sustaining them in the way that the development of the Shrewsbury Health and Wellbeing Hub would have allowed."

The GP practices involved would have been The Beeches Medical Practice, Belvidere Medical Practice, Claremont Bank Surgery, Marden Medical Practice, Marysville Medical Practice and South Hermitage Surgery.

Under the plan all of the surgeries would have left their current premises, and relocated to the same building – taking more than 40,000 patients with them - but proponents of the scheme say they would all would remain individual, distinct practices.