Details have emerged this morning of the deal signed at Manchester Town Hall which sets out the shared plan for £6 billion health and social care funding in Greater Manchester.
This move sees NHS England, 12 NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups, 15 NHS providers and 10 local authorities agree a framework for health and social care, with plans for joint decision-making onintegrated care to support physical, mental and social wellbeing.
The Chancellor has placed his Northern Powerhouse strategy at the heart of the nation’s growth plans and this has created the platform for today’s announcement.
The Memorandum of Understanding, approved and countersigned by the Chancellor George Osborne and the Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, is intended to put local people in the driving seat for deciding on health and care services that suit Greater Manchester.
It will also help in the long-term to ease pressure on hospitals, while focusing on services in community that bring health and social care closer to home.
Integrated care in Greater Manchester will focus more on preventative work in the community, putting strategies in place to keep people well and as independent as possible.
For example, people with long-term conditions like asthma or heart conditions will be treated by specialists in the community as much as possible, only going to hospital when necessary.
NHS England has agreed all plans with the Greater Manchester Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), NHS providers and local councils to cement a place-based approach to join up health and social care.
This approach helps to realise the vision set out in the NHS’s Five Year Forward View.
The agreement, they say, does not require any reorganisation of the NHS or its principles.
The Chancellor identified governance and devolution as a key component of his Northern Powerhouse strategy that has paved the way for today’s further devolution.
The scope of the Memorandum of Understanding includes the entire health and social care system in Greater Manchester, including adult, primary and social care, mental health and community services and public health.
The second part of the agreement provides a framework for strategies around governance and regulation, resources and finances, the property estate, health education, workforce and information sharing and systems being brought together.
The memorandum is an outline agreement and more details will follow in due course.
From now, Greater Manchester will start making its own decisions and a transitional plan or roadmap will come into effect from April 1.
This roadmap will provide the foundations for joined up business and investment proposals, along with a joint Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Strategy – until full devolution of health and care services is in place by April 2016.
Lord Peter Smith, chair of Greater Manchester Combined Authority, said: “This is another defining moment in Greater Manchester’s devolution journey. The scope and nature of this unprecedented agreement means we are proudly breaking new ground once more.
“I want to make absolutely clear that this is not, as it has been wrongly portrayed in some quarters, a town hall takeover of Greater Manchester’s NHS budget. We will be working together with our NHS colleagues in the region to make joint decisions which reflect local priorities. Ultimately this will be via a new strategic health and social care partnership board. This is about decisions about Greater Manchester being taken in Greater Manchester in an integrated way, not being taken away from experts.”
