More control handed back to Brighton and Hove doctors

The area’s Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) was rated ‘Inadequate’ last year as it was deemed to be ‘failed to discharge its functions’.

It was then placed in legal directions in August, which means the CCG has less control over the decisions it makes to commission services for patients.

To have these lifted, the CCG had to achieve in five areas - improving the organisation’s leadership, developing a capacity and capability plan, reviewing the governance of the organisation, developing a credible commissioning plan, and creating a plan to improve waiting times for treatment and A&E.

The announcement to lift legal directions comes a month after the CCG was rated as ‘Good’ by NHS England.

Accountable officer Adam Doyle, who joined the CCG in October at the same time as clinical chair David Supple, said: “To get out of legal directions has not been easy and we have had to change a lot of things within the organisation very quickly.

“This has been tough but our staff have risen to the challenge and I would like to thank them all for their continued hard work and for the support of our partners across the local health system.

“Alongside the changes we have been making within the CCG, we have also been working hard on plans to transform and improve local services across the city for the future.

“We will now be putting all our energy in developing and delivering these plans, alongside the large amount of public engagement we are doing as part of our Big Health and Care Conversation, to ensure local residents continue to have access to sustainable services for years to come.”

Dr Supple added: “This is very positive news for our organisation but it is also good news for our patients as we can now concentrate more freely on what improvements we can make to meet the needs of the local population.

“A particular focus for us will be around improving and transforming primary care, which involves GP and other non-hospital services.

“For example, we want to make GP practices across the city more resilient for the future, by looking at new ways of working and giving GPs access to greater support. We will now be working with our members and the public to develop plans on how we can best achieve this.”