The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, has accepted the advice of the Independent Reconfiguration Panel (IRP) that the new Epsom and St Helier hospital, to be built as part of the government’s Health Infrastructure Plan, should be located in Sutton.
The decision to build the new hospital in Sutton was referred to the IRP by the Health Secretary last month following public consultation in the spring.
The panel considered that the proposals are in the interest of local health services and will improve health outcomes locally. They did not find any reason to disagree with the choice of Sutton as the site for the new hospital, and concluded that that the proposals should proceed.
The brand new hospital will now be built in Sutton, with district health services remaining in modernised buildings at Epsom and St Helier. Patients and the public will now be engaged in shaping the new services in order to gain maximum benefit from them.
Matt Hancock says: “This new hospital will be transformational for patients and staff at Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals Trust and the wider community. I look forward to seeing the hospital take shape over the coming months and years, and hope that the public will be as involved as possible in shaping the new services.”
Daniel Elkeles, Chief Executive of Epsom and St Helier University Hospital Trust, says:
“We welcome the advice from the Independent Reconfiguration Panel, and are delighted that the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has agreed that we should proceed with investing £500 million in a new hospital at Sutton, and in Epsom and St Helier hospitals.
“We are now proceeding at full speed to design the new hospitals and will soon be engaging with our local communities on the new hospital facilities. All being well we aim to have builders on site in Sutton in Spring 2022, with a new Specialist Emergency Care Hospital opening in 2025.”
