Steve Barclay says government invested 'significantly on RAAC' amid claims Rishi Sunak blocked rebuilding of hospitals. Source: Sky News
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00:00 Well what Rishi Sunak as Chancellor put in place was a £700 million fund for RAC replacement.
00:06 That was put in place from 2021. In fact we were on this issue early, we were surveying
00:11 hospitals from 2019 and we've been following the Institute for Structural Engineers advice
00:17 which is that not all RAC has to be replaced, what we need to do is monitor it, assess it
00:22 and where there is a concern with deterioration then it does need to be replaced and that's
00:27 why a £700 million fund was put in place. Two schemes for full replacement of those
00:32 hospitals were agreed but further work was then commissioned and a study from MacDonald
00:38 was then commissioned to assess the other five hospitals. Once we got that information
00:43 those schemes have then come into the programme. So a significant investment specifically in
00:49 RAC and of course this government has the biggest ever in the history of the NHS investment
00:54 in the NHS estate, over £20 billion in the new hospitals programme.