Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to paragraph 4.22 of the Government Response to the Naylor Review, published in January 2018, what steps the Property Board takes to improve the quality of business cases.

On behalf of the NHS Property Board, NHS England and NHS Improvement are developing plans for the training of key National Health Service staff involved in the development, assurance and approval of capital investment business cases. It is anticipated that this will be rolled out during 2018/19. They will focus efforts on building capability within the NHS to improve the quality of business cases coming forward for approval. They will work closely with commissioners and providers from the early stages of business case development to provide advice and guidance to enable them to meet the required standards for approval.

In order to build greater capability within the NHS, we are establishing a single, integrated strategic estates planning team to support sustainability and transformation partnerships (STPs) in delivering their transformation plans. The team will be a centre of expertise and primary source of support on strategic estates planning advice, and report to the NHS Property Board. Working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement, the team will provide advice to STPs and NHS organisations in relation to best practice business case development to support the timely delivery of better quality business cases.