黑洞社区

The former chief executive of the NHS has urged construction companies to approach the health service with space-saving designs that will help cut costs by reducing staff numbers.

Nigel Crisp, chief executive of the NHS between 2000 and 2006 and peer in the House of Lords, told 黑洞社区 that construction firms need to be more proactive about winning healthcare work by contributing towards the government鈥檚 goal of cutting 拢21bn from NHS costs by 2014.

He said: 鈥淭he construction industry can support the NHS by suggesting designs that require less staff. Can these designs shorten processes between outpatient wards, operating theatres, recovery units and wards and allow for the number if people required for each process to be cut?

鈥淎rchitects, designers and contractors need to make the best, more efficient use, of the NHS鈥� most costly ingredient: people. This will be a key selling point for people wanting to bid for work.鈥�

Lord Crisp鈥檚 comments came as former home secretary David Blunkett criticised the government鈥檚 NHS reforms, laid out in the Health and Social Care Bill, for being unclear.

He said: 鈥淭he more that ministers endeavour to prove that they will no longer be involved in critical decisions, the more they prove that that is exactly where we will be in years to come. The more they indicate that power will lie at the local level with the abolition of strategic health authorities and primary care trusts, the more we can see that decisions will be fragmented, uncoordinated and lacking in any strategic framework.鈥�