News / Hakin: 212 CCGs have reached 'landmark'

The NHS in England has reached a ‘landmark moment’ in the development of the new clinically led commissioning system, according to NHS Commissioning Board (NCB) national director of commissioning development Dame Barbara Hakin.

In May, the NCB revealed 212 clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) will be established from April next year and published indicative running cost allowances for the groups in 2013/14.

According to the board, while the running cost allowance has been set at up to £25 per head of population per year, the allowances had not been calculated by simply multiplying the CCG population by 25. Instead it said basing them on GP-registered lists, moderated at local authority level was the fairest way to proceed.

This took account of the unregistered population and matched the Office for National Statistics population projection.

The indicative allowance ranges from £21.68m (North, East and West Devon CCG) to £1.6m (Corby CCG). The CCGs have populations of 901,200 and 67,800 respectively.

The NCB said 35 applicants would be assessed in the first wave in July, and a further three waves would take place later this year.

Speaking as the number and configuration of CCGs was revealed, Dame Barbara commented: ‘This is a real landmark moment and is a credit to everyone involved in developing CCGs and the new clinically led commissioning system.’

Commissioning support services (CSSs) also took a step forward in May as the NCB announced 23 of the 26 CSSs that submitted outline business cases to the second checkpoint review will proceed to the next stage. However, it found ‘issues that need more rapid management’ in nine of the 23.

A customer survey for the second checkpoint found just over half of CCGs planned to take at least 50% of support services from CSSs during transition. Almost a third of the services would be provided in-house, 15% shared with other CCGs and 3% from outside the NHS.

While the majority were content to keep the same CSS in 2012/13, 10% wished to exercise choice.

On average, CCGs have set aside £11.52 per head for services from CSSs, but this figure varies from £3 to £25 per head. While 45% of them said the offer was affordable, 43% did not know and 12% suggested it was not.