Speaking during the Westminster Health Forum new estates policy conference this morning, Lord Hutton urged the Government not to waste another year debating models of private-public partnerships.

Lord Hutton said: ‘Private capital today is like a reservoir behind a dam. It's a fund of long-term capital from pension funds and insurers looking for stable social infrastructure projects to invest in.'

Lord Hutton said private capital had delivered 90 hospitals in less than a decade in the early 2000s or more than double in half the time than that scheduled for the New Hospitals Programme.

The NAO has predicted that construction delays cost the NHS £100-140m a year with the current maintenance backlog standing at almost £15bn.

Lord Hutton said PFI was ‘not a perfect model', acknowledging issues with flexibility and transparency and the rigidity of some of the contracting frameworks but argued ‘it is still wrong to conclude from those shortcomings that all forms of public-private partnership are fatally flawed somehow'.

‘Under PFI, complex facilities were built on time and on budget and have been at far higher standard than non-PPP estates,' Lord Hutton said.

He highlighted how private capital models had evolved to achieve 17-35% cost reductions in Germany and argued Local Improvement Finance Trusts (LIFT) provided a model that works for neighbourhood health centres and had delivered more than 300 primary and community care facilities in England.

‘With political will, clear commissioning signals and streamlined approvals, a significant wave of neighbourhood facilities could be commissioned within a year or two whether new builds or repurposing existing assets and spare capacity,' Lord Hutton said.

‘The LIFT platform gives us a ready-made delivery vehicle and we should definitely pick it up and run with it.'