18.08.16
NHSI outlines priority benchmark areas for STP consolidated business plans
NHS Improvement (NHSI) engagement support teams will be in place from September to closely work with the 44 sustainability and transformation plan (STP) leads to support the drafting and finalising of all consolidation business plans.
In a letter to the CEOs and financial directors of all trusts and FTs, the regulator said it has created a back office template which should be applicable to acute specialist, mental health and community trusts.
It has also created a pathology template, but it admitted it may not be as applicable to specialist, mental health and community trusts. It still wants everyone to complete this as it will inform plans on consolidation.
Jeremy Marlow, executive director of operational productivity at NHSI, said: “Taking into account the feedback we have received we will be testing the two templates with a group of providers over the next two weeks and will send out templates for all providers to complete in early September for return by the end of the month.
“The templates and data will then be shared with your STP lead who, from September and with the help of our engagement support teams, will work with all trusts – acute, specialist, community and mental health – to gather data and work across the whole health economy to support the services consolidation.”
On back office functions, Marlow added, NHSI plans to benchmark in several areas and that trusts should prioritise finance, including income planning, management accounts, accounts payable and internal audit.
Additionally, trusts should look into HR, specifically recruitment, workforce analytics, the temp/staff bank team, and occupational health; procurement in terms of the buying/contract management, catalogue management and materials management; payroll; governance and risk; estates and facilities; and legal services.
“You should be working with the other providers in your STP footprints in considering, and where appropriate developing, consolidation plans in these areas,” said Marlow. “In time we will support you to examine all of your corporate and administrative costs.”
He added that over the next few weeks, based on recently submitted STP two-page plans, NHSI will be evaluating the level of support all trusts and STPs require “to ensure your STP can submit your two business cases to consolidate back office functions and pathology services”.
Marlow said more details on how this support will work will be set out in early September when NHSI sends out the templates.
Recently NHS England’s CEO Simon Stevens said that the NHS-led STPs, which received much criticism before they were submitted at the end of June, had made ‘substantial progress’ and he expected most would be ready for final sign-off by October.
But Dame Fiona Caldicott, the national Data guardian, recently told NHE that she didn’t feel the NHS was “quite ready” for sharing back-office function on data security.
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