PM Andy Burnham guaranteed no further delay to Watford General's rebuild on a three-hour visit with Yvette Cooper on Monday. Work is due to start in 2032.
The Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, and the Health Secretary, Yvette Cooper, visited Watford General Hospital on Monday 9 November. The visit lasted about three hours, according to Watford’s MP, Matt Turmaine, who met them both on arrival and used the time to make the case again for the town’s new hospital.
Updated 10 November: the Prime Minister’s own comments on the new hospital, made to reporters during the visit, have been added below.
His office’s photographs show the pair being greeted outside the hospital, meeting Mr Turmaine during the tour, and breaking off to have a cup of tea with staff.
What the MP said
“Everyone should welcome the visit of Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Health Secretary Yvette Cooper to Watford,” Mr Turmaine said.
“The comprehensive visit was around three hours long and it was brilliant to spend some time with them both, once again championing the cause of Watford’s new hospital, just as I have been doing in the corridors of power at Westminster.”
He blamed the long wait on decisions taken 16 years ago. “In 2010 the incoming Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government cancelled Labour’s plans for a new hospital causing a 14-year delay. If they hadn’t done that, we’d already have a new hospital by now.”
And he pointed to work on the site since. “There has been considerable progress over the last two years and it is important to recognise that a lot of hard work has gone into getting things moving. Thanks to this government, land continues to be freed up to accommodate the new hospital, we’re improving the power supply to the site and installing a new oxygen supply system.”
2 photos, swipe or scroll. Photos: supplied by Matt Turmaine MP
What the Prime Minister said
Mr Burnham was asked during the visit whether the timetable set out under his predecessor, Sir Keir Starmer, would be met. “I will give you that guarantee that it now shouldn’t be subject to further delay,” he told the Watford Observer. “There is a timetable that has been set out and agreed and we will move forward on that basis.”
He said Watford had “waited long enough for its hospital” and that he wanted commitments made many years ago to be “finally followed through”. He said he understood the frustration, having heard the case for a new hospital when he visited as Health Secretary under Gordon Brown, accepted that “not enough progress has been made”, and laid most of the blame on the last government. He credited Mr Turmaine’s lobbying with helping to get the project back “on track”.
He also praised the hospital for ending corridor care and climbing the NHS league tables. “It has been a brilliant thing to be here today and hear the confidence of staff about the changes they have made,” he said. “There was an issue here with corridor care a few years ago but they together as a team have decided to turn it around and successfully so.”
The visit coincided with a £40 million government programme, announced the same day, under which GP practices will give up to 300,000 vulnerable patients extra support this winter to keep them out of hospital.
Where the new hospital stands
The Prime Minister’s guarantee is that the current timetable will not slip, not that it will be brought forward. Construction of the new hospital is scheduled to start in 2032, according to West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust’s page on the scheme. The trust says it is keeping a project team in place so it can start earlier if an opportunity arises. Outline planning permission was granted in September 2023, and the site preparation works Mr Turmaine describes are already under way: the background is in our Watford planning news page.
Watford’s elected mayor, Peter Taylor, who is the Liberal Democrats’ prospective parliamentary candidate, was unconvinced. A guarantee of no further delay “rings hollow when they say that work might not start until 2034”, he told the Observer. “Everyone connected with Watford General deserves so much more than warm words. We need to start rebuilding our hospital now.”
What it means for you
Watford General stays open as normal; nothing said on Monday changes services or appointments. The Prime Minister’s commitment is to the existing timetable, a start on site in 2032, with no further slippage. If the trust or the Department of Health and Social Care publishes an earlier date, we will report it.
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