§ Mr. PaiceTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the contracts let or in the process of tendering for the provision of instrument sterilisation services to NHS trust hospitals giving the(a) location of each service, (b) the hospitals for which it will provide the service and (c) the dates of the period of contract; and what further contracts for similar services he intends to let in each of the next three years. [184756]
§ Mr. Hutton[holding answer 16 July 2004]: Contracts for the provision of sterile services may arise as a result of an individual outsourcing procurement, as part of a large private finance initiative or public private partnership or where one national health service trust provides such services for others.
Decisions on whether to let contracts and to whom are for individual NHS trusts to take, within the rules relating to such procurements and details are not held centrally.
As part of their strategies for modernising sterile services, strategic health authorities are encouraging the setting up of joint ventures, which entails a number of NHS trusts pooling their demand, and advertising jointly for a private sector partner. Information about the joint ventures established so far is set out in the table. The details of these contracts have not yet been agreed.
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Trusts Date of advertisement The Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust June 2003 Pan Birmingham Group University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust November 2003 Good Hope Hospital NHS Trust Birmingham Women's Healthcare NHS Trust Birmingham Children's Hospital NHS Trust Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust Royal Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Trust Birmingham Heartlands and Solihull Hospitals NHS Trust South Birmingham Primary Care Trust
Trusts Date of advertisement Kent Group The Medway NHS Trust November 2003 Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust East Kent Hospitals NHS Trust Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust South Manchester and North Cheshire Group South Manchester University Hospital Trust November 2003 North Cheshire Hospitals NHS Trust Thames Valley Group Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust November 2003 Heatherwood and Wexham Park NHS Trust Buckinghamshire Hospitals NHS Trust