21 Jan 2025
The construction of a new hospital on the site of Watford General Hospital is not expected to start until between 2032 to 2034.
The new Labour Government has announced that the New Hospitals Programme, one of the flagship policies of their Tory predecessors, will now be substantially delayed.
The annual report of the Infrastructure Projects Authority (IPA) has said the previous scheme for 40 new hospitals by 2030 was unachievable, highlighting major issues with the schedule and budget.
The cost of the New Hospitals Programme, first announced by then-PM Boris Johnson in 2019, has increased from £20billion to close to £50billion, and very little progress has been made in this time.
Now Labour health secretary Wes Streeting has revealed substantial delays to the projects, with some not starting until 2035-39.
The earliest work on Watford Hospital will commence is likely to be 2032, with costs now in the region of £1.2billion.
St Albans MP Daisy Cooper responded to the news: ““This is a massive blow to patients and NHS staff in our area. The previous Conservative Government promised us, the people of west Hertfordshire, that we would get a new A&E hospital at Watford General and even claimed that it was fully funded. We can now see that those claims were nothing more than lies.
“But now it’s Labour ministers who have decided to delay the construction date for potentially seven to nine years without even visiting our A&E hospital to see the state of disrepair for themselves.
“The delay raises more questions than answers.
“Watford General Hospital has the land, the planning permission and the backing of clinicians – so the Government need to explain why Watford General is near the bottom of the list not the top.
“We also need to know whether the Government will provide the money we need to cover the cost of repairs given that the hospital will continue to crumble whilst we wait for the re-build.
“We also urgently need to know what implications this has for the Mount Vernon Cancer Centre as well, which was due to move onto the Watford General Hospital site to deliver vital cancer services, to people in St Albans and across the west Herts area.
“It’s clear that the Conservative’s initial promise from 2019 simply wasn’t worth the paper that it was written on, but local people will now feel incredibly let down with the Labour Government’s delays too.
“Our local A&E hospital is shovel-ready and I will keep fighting for the Government to give us the green-light much, much sooner.”
Long-standing local campaigner for an entirely new hospital for west Herts, Andy Love, also responded.
He said: “Daisy Cooper can say all she wants about successive governments letting the people of west Herts down over a new hospital but, in my opinion, she has to shoulder some of the blame too for steadfastly backing the redevelopment of Watford General hospital despite the build costs spiraling up from £300m in 2019 to the latest estimate of £1.5billion -2billion!
“Daisy has ignored many of her St Albans residents’ calls for her to support the campaign for a more accessible, suitable and larger site for west Herts new A&E hospital. She has instead sided with her Liberal Democratic colleagues in Watford to have Watford General hospital rebuilt on the current hard to get to, constrained and steeply sloped Vicarage Road car park.
“She says the hospital trust have the land to build a new hospital but fails to mention that this land is currently used as a car park and the new Vicarage Road multi-storey car park hasn’t even got the capacity to deal adequately with the current Watford hospital let alone a vastly larger new larger.
“She also fails to mention that the three towers design for Watford’s new hospital has to be high rise because they don’t have sufficient land to build anything other than a high rise hospital!
“She mentions Mount Vernon Cancer Centre moving to Watford hospital but she fails to mention that the current design doesn’t incorporate the cancer centre and if they did squeeze Mount Vernon in, it would be highly risky to have vulnerable cancer patients being in close contact with other people because there is only one multi-storey car park.
“Daisy Cooper should remember that she is St Albans MP and not Watford’s or west Herts’.
“St Albans will have a massive strategic rail freight interchange operational by the time the new hospital in Watford is started. Has Daisy Cooper even considered how residents from St Albans will get to the Watford hospital when there are estimated to be an additional 10,000 vehicles daily on south St Albans’ road network?
“Daisy Cooper should be asked to explain why she was so adamant that West Herts Hospital Trust were right and the New Hospital Campaigners were wrong when campaigners said that a new site was affordable and could be delivered within the same timeframe as a new Watford Hospital.
“If there was ever a time to review the locations available for west Herts new large hospital, it is definitely now.
“A completion date of 2026 is not now the driver for building a new hospital as we have at least seven to nine years before the Watford Hospital rebuild is due to start.
”Finding a more suitable and central location for our new hospital will also avoid the need to build a new hospital so close to the current dilapidated Watford General with all the inconvenience and nastiness that will bring for patients, staff and visitors!
“It won’t happen, but it would be good to see Daisy Cooper for once fighting for a new A&E hospital that is more accessible for St Albans residents now the goalposts for building a new Watford Hospital have changed so drastically!”
