North Northamptonshire MPs Peter Bone, Tom Pursglove and Philip Hollobone met with the Prime Minister in No. 10 earlier this week to press the case for more investment into Kettering General Hospital.
The three MPs met with the PM this week at a breakfast meeting in No. 10 ahead of a formal meeting of the Cabinet.
KGH is one of the 40 new hospitals which form part of the National Hospitals Programme and £396m has been pledged by the Government to redevelop the hospital.
Most of this funding will come in the period 2025-30, but the start of the drawdown of an initial tranche of £46m to facilitate enabling works ahead of the main development was promised in late 2019 for delivery before 2024.
The Prime Minister, who visited KGH in January 2020 when he spent 5 hours talking with staff on the nightshift until 3am, was told by the three MPs that NHS bureaucracy was holding up the release of this initial funding and that the bottleneck needed to be unblocked.
KGH plans to use an early drawdown of funding to tackle its serious power supply issues.
For power, Kettering General Hospital presently relies on:
- a temporary steam boiler plant erected on flatbeds in the car park 10 years ago (pictured above)
- a life expired 50 year old steam distribution pipework
- 50 year old switchgear, and
- the main high voltage electricity supply has reached maximum capacity.
The Prime Minister was impressed by the MPs’ presentation and immediately requested his Chief of Staff to get to the bottom of the hold up.
Peter Bone MP who organised the meeting said:
“The Prime Minister recognizes how important KGH is to all of us who live in North Northamptonshire and wants to get the additional investment into the hospital as soon as possible.”
Philip Hollobone MP said:
“KGH is a much loved local hospital valued by all. Local residents know that we need a new Urgent Care Hub to replace the overcrowded A&E and new wards in new buildings. We need to unlock this investment stream as soon as possible.”
KGH is due to submit detailed business cases to the central NHS imminently to address the electrical infrastructure risk and the need for a new power plant.
The three MPs will continue to pursue this issue until the funds are forthcoming.
