Boris Johnson drawn into row over 'unsafe' Hillingdon hospital

Boris Johnson has been drawn into a row over the future of his local hospital, parts of which are so dangerous that patients have been moved out of wards to ensure their safety.

The prime minister has become involved in a dispute involving NHS chiefs and local MPs over whether Hillingdon hospital in his north-west London constituency should be rebuilt where it stands, when it is knocked down, or on another site.

The hospital is so decrepit it recently had to move all the child patients out of its paediatrics department because serious subsidence had left the unit unsafe to use. The Peter Pan inpatient ward, Tinkerbell outpatient ward and Wendy outpatients facility all had to leave their base in the paediatric unit, which Johnson reopened after a major refurbishment five years ago.

They were rehoused in other parts of the crumbling 62-year-old hospital “as a precautionary measure” after structural engineers warned that the units posed a risk to patients and staff. It was “an unfortunate legacy of our ageing estate”, said Sarah Tedford, the hospital’s chief executive.

Hillingdon’s infrastructure has long been recognised within the NHS as a problem and the trust has developed plans for it to be replaced.

One senior NHS figure described the state of its buildings as “appalling – the worst of any hospital in London”. Its problems are so serious that the Treasury recently gave it a £16.5m emergency loan to carry out repairs to pipes and its incinerator and heating system and to buynew equipment. But the cost of fixing its backlog of maintenance issues, some of which are classed as critical, is £210m – the second largest among the NHS in England’s 240 trusts.

The trust is planning to move staff out of their offices at the hospital into rented premises in Hillingdon town centre, about a mile away, because their safety at work cannot be guaranteed. At recent board meetings, trust bosses voiced their concern at what its recently departed chair, Prof Liz Paice, called “our failing estate”.

The rapid deterioration of the district general hospital’s buildings has forced the trust’s bosses and health service leaders nationally to intensify discussions about where the new hospital, which is expected to cost about £500m, should be built.

The hospital has had plans for several years to build a new facility nearby, elsewhere in the borough of Hillingdon, at a site owned and occupied by Brunel University. Two of the borough’s three MPs – John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, and Nick Hurd, the Northern Ireland minister and minister for London – want the trust to relocate there.

However, in a change of tack, Tedford and the trust’s new chair, Sir Amyas Morse – who recently retired as the head of the National Audit Office – are both lobbying for the new hospital to be built on its existing site. They argue it would be quicker and cheaper to do that than pursue the long established plan to link up with Brunel, which is likely to meet local opposition.

They talked Johnson through their plans on his most recent visit, on 11 October. Afterwards, he posted a video on his Facebook page in which he said the hospital needed “a complete rebuild” but did not say which option he favoured.

If there is a general election, Hillingdon’s future is likely to become a key issue for voters in Johnson’s Uxbridge and Ruislip South constituency, for whom it is their local hospital, where he is defending a 5,034 majority.

Hillingdon is not one of the six crumbling hospitals Johnson has pledged will share £2.7bn to undertake total rebuilds. But it is one of 20 trusts that have been given £100m of “seed money” between them to work up detailed plans to do the same in the near future.

“I have been campaigning for a new hospital for the last decade. The government has to act now because wards are being closed down as unsafe. I have worked with the hospital and university to link the two institutions ideally on the same university site”, said McDonnell.

Hurd said: “The state of Hillingdon hospital has been completely unacceptable for some time. The staff there do a good job despite the facilities, not because of them. I very rarely hear complaints, but patients frankly deserve better. I am all for ambition in building a new hospital and a state of the art medical campus. I was presented with the Brunel option and it was exciting – if it can be delivered.

Disclosure of Hillingdon’s crumbling infrastructure comes days after the latest official figures showed that the cost of fixing the backlog of maintenance problems in the NHS in England has risen in the last year from £6bn to £6.5bn.

The Guardian revealed earlier this month that Mount Vernon hospital, which is situated beside the Hillingdon, had been condemned as unfit for purpose by an internal NHS “urgent review” and recommended for closure. It is set to be rebuilt elsewhere, raising the possibility that most or all of the large site containing the two hospitals could be cleared of most or all of its existing NHS facilities and used for a massive housing development.

A Brunel University spokesperson said: “We have been working with Hillingdon hospital and other NHS partners on the option to design and build a new health campus on the Brunel site, which is immediately to the south of the university and is currently vacant.

“A new hospital here would not be constrained by the infrastructure of the current hospital, and would be informed by hospital design that’s proven to work well for patients, staff and the local community. We understand that it is one option that is being considered alongside others in an options appraisal.”