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£180 Million NHS Flagship for Edinburgh
21/08/1998
The new £180 million Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh (RIE), for which contracts were signed today, will be a symbol of the modernisation of the NHS in Scotland, Scottish Secretary Donald Dewar said today.
The RIE will be:
- the largest new hospital to be built in Scotland in the 50 year history of the NHS
- the largest public/private partnership project yet within the NHS in the United Kingdom
- linked to a new £38 million Medical School, the most significant capital development in medical education in the United Kingdom for 20 years.
Speaking as he viewed the site of the hospital at Little France in south east Edinburgh, Mr Dewar said:
"Innovative, efficient, modern, inclusive, and caring - these are just some of the words needed to describe the new state of the art RIE. This will be a flagship hospital for the modern NHS in which we are investing record levels of resources.
"This Government promised a pragmatic approach to building the new facilities we need - direct from the public purse, from innovative partnerships between Boards and Trusts, and through the Private Finance Initiative. We promised to build three brand new hospitals through PFI at Law, Hairmyres and Edinburgh. Today marks the full delivery of that promise.
"In 2002 this new hospital will take over from its 119-year-old Victorian predecessor. We will then have a very different NHS to that which we see today. Waiting lists will be down to 75,000. There will also be shorter waiting times for patients. Modern technology will provide patients with 'airline style' booking of hospital appointments from their GP's surgery.
"Quite simply, it will be the most modern, high-quality health service in Europe."
"The community which the RIE serves will also see a very different hospital from its predecessor. Gone, for example, will be outdated buildings and practices such as mixed sex wards. Patients will be provided with modern accommodation which guarantees them dignity.
"But new bricks and mortar will be only part of the radical changes to benefit patients. They will also see:
- a 'care team' assigned throughout the patient's stay, reducing the number of staff encountered so the patient is able to develop better relationships
- redesigned services such as 'one-stop clinics' which will offer patients a comprehensive test and diagnosis service in a single visit
- a more seamless relationship between primary, community and the acute care sectors where patients can get specialist treatment closer to their homes - provided by hospital-based clinicians in outreach clinics set up in new Community Treatment Centres."
"This will be a hospital in which the people of the Lothians can take justifiable pride. If ever a hospital was designed to care - this is it."
BACKGROUND
1. The 30 year contract was signed with Consort Healthcare (Edinburgh Royal Infirmary) Ltd, a private sector consortium comprising BICC plc, The Royal Bank of Scotland plc and Morrison Construction Group plc. The main contractor is Balfour Beatty with Haden FM providing the facilities management.
The consortium will build and maintain the facilities and provide ancillary services such as catering, cleaning and portering. All clinical services will be provided by the NHS.
2. The new hospital will have 869 beds, 24 theatres and will achieve the Lothian Acute Strategy objective of releasing £11 million a year for reinvestment into primary and community healthcare within the Lothians.
3. The contract also provides for the construction of a £38 million University of Edinburgh Medical School which is being grant funded by The Scottish Office and the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council. It will accommodate 450 medical undergraduate students as well as science honours students, taught and research post-graduates and 400 medical school staff. Target for occupation is 2002.
4. This is the third major Private Finance Initiative (PFI) project in health. In April a contract was signed by Hairmyres and Stonehouse Hospitals NHS Trust for a £68 million acute district general hospital and in June a contract was signed by Law Hospital NHS Trust for a £100 million district general hospital.
5. The new hospital project is one of the 50 'significant' projects identified by the HM Treasury PFI Taskforce.
News Release: 1673/98
21 August, 1998