Commercial Support Units
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The current commercial and procurement model in the NHS is recognised as piecemeal, with services provided by overlapping agencies and, as a result, effectively excluding many providers and commissioners from fully responding to their local service users.
The publication of the Department of Health’s (DoH) policy Necessity not Nicety in May 2009 agreed that closer alignment is required through the establishment of regional Commercial Support Units (CSUs). CSUs are intended to promote a rapid build-up of commercial skills, whilst providing a central focal point of access for commissioners and providers (including third and private sector), to access commercial and contracting skills.
Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) will under the Health White Paper be transferring commissioning of healthcare services to GP Commissioning Consortia. By April 2012 all commissioning will be undertaken by these consortia and by April 2013 they will be directly funded by the DoH and accountable for their commissioning decisions.
Key Points
CSU network
It is intended that approximately 20 CSUs will be established across the NHS network in England, initially created by Strategic Health Authorities with £20 million set aside in 2009-10 for development. They are expected to become operational within one year. Many CSUs are likely to evolve from existing commercial and procurement hubs.
Third and private sector providers
The establishment of CSUs will provide for unambiguous and universal advice to third and private sector providers to maximise their contribution to the provision of healthcare.
PASA
The functions of PASA have been transferred to OGC Buying Solutions.
Procurement
Complementing the establishment of the CSUs is the introduction in October 2008 of NHS Supply2Health (www.supply2health.nhs.uk). PCTs are required to use NHS Supply2Health to advertise all clinical services contract opportunities. NHS Supply2Health provides a single source of information for providers looking for advertisements of clinical services contract opportunities, where the PCT is the main contracting authority. It is not clear yet, as to whether this requirement will transfer to GP Commissioning Consortia but we assume that will be the case.
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