Health and Care Bill: special health authority time limits
Updated 10 March 2022
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This fact sheet explains how the government plans to remove the 3-year time limit on special health authorities.
Background
All health arm’s length bodies (ALBs) carry out important functions necessary for delivering on the Department of Health and Social Care’s objectives.
Special health authorities (SpHAs) are ALBs created by the Secretary of State through secondary legislation. They are subject to direction by the Secretary of State in relation to the functions to be carried out, the exercise of those functions and allocation of funding.
Existing legislation sets automatic expiry dates on SpHAs set up after 2012, which requires their existence to be formally extended every 3 years. This proposal will remove the 3-year time limit on all SpHAs established by the Secretary of State.
It was intended that new SpHAs would be created to carry out time-limited functions. At the time of the passing of the Health and Social Care Act 2012, some SpHAs had permanent, ongoing functions, while other SpHAs were intended to have a limited lifespan or to be converted into non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs).
Since then, the functions of most pre-existing SpHAs have been added-to or amended, sometimes significantly, and many of the functions of SpHAs are considered to be enduring.
What the bill will do
The Bill will remove the current 3 year automatic expiry date for SpHAs established after 2012.
There are currently 5 SpHAs:
- NHS Business Services Authority (NHS BSA)
- NHS Blood and Transplant (NHS B&T)
- NHS Litigation Authority (known operationally as NHS Resolution)
- NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHS CFA)
- NHS Trust Development Authority (NHS TDA). NHS TDA is to be merged into NHS England in this Bill
The time limit is unnecessary as the functions of SpHAs are enduring. It is also inconsistent as the time limits only impact one current SpHA, the NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHS CFA).
If further SpHAs were to be created, they would, currently, also be subject to the time limit legislation which would lead to continued inconsistency of treatment between SpHAs. The removal of the automatic expiry dates would remove this inconsistency.
How these provisions help reduce bureaucracy
Formally extending a SpHA’s existence every 3 years is time consuming and bureaucratic, and creates unnecessary administration costs for the SpHAs and the Department.
The removal of the time limit only applies to NHS CFA as the other SpHAs were in existence prior to the introduction of a time limit. Therefore, the need to renew NHS CFA every 3 years is an anomaly.
All SpHAs will, therefore, be treated equally in legislation and a bureaucratic, time consuming process will be removed.
Another consequence of this policy is that, because the NHS CFA and any future SpHAs will not be subjected to being reviewed and potentially closed every 3 years, staff should be reassured of the stability of their posts.
Further information
Department of Health and Social Care, Integration and innovation: working together to improve health and social care for all, February 2021