Consultation on the draft Addendum to your statutory duties – A reference guide for NHS foundation trust governors

Overview

As part of the development of Integrated Care Systems, NHS England are committed to supporting NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts to work effectively within systems.

We have prepared a draft Addendum to Your statutory duties – reference guide for NHS foundation trust governors. Alongside the Addendum, we are also currently consulting separately on a draft Code of governance for NHS provider trusts and draft Guidance on good governance and collaboration under the NHS provider licence. Together, the Code, Addendum, and Guidance on good governance and collaboration will support trusts to work effectively within Integrated Care Systems.

The draft Addendum to the guide for governors sets out how, and will support governors to, carry out their statutory duties as Integrated Care Systems develop and trusts are expected to collaborate effectively with system partners.

The NHS Long Term Plan and Integrated Care Systems: Design Framework have set a clear expectation that NHS trusts and foundation trusts will play an active and strong leadership role within systems. This impacts what councils of governors will now need to consider when performing their statutory duties. The draft Addendum to the guide for governors therefore aims to support NHS foundation trusts and their governors with this change, by:

1.  Supplementing the existing guide for governors and explaining how the duties of NHS foundation trust councils of governors support system-working and collaboration, along with examples of how councils of governors and boards and work together well.
2.  Detailing additional considerations (on top of those in the existing guide for governors) regarding system working, that foundation trust governors may wish to discuss with their trust's board, on the specific statutory duties to:
a.  Hold the non-executive directors individually and collectively to account for the performance of the board of directors.
b.  Represent the interests of the members of the NHS foundation trust and the public.
c.  Approve “significant transactions”, mergers, acquisitions, separations or dissolutions.
3.  Making it clear that in carrying out their duties, foundation trust councils of governors should not be restricted to representing the interests of a narrow section of the public served by the foundation trust (ie patients and the public within the vicinity of the trust, or those who form governors' own electorates). Instead, councils of governors should form a rounded view of the interests of the 'public at large'. This would include the population of the local system of which the foundation trust is part.

The evolving role of NHS foundation trust councils of governors within Integrated Care Systems

We consider the new addendum as a first step to clarifying councils of governors' roles in the context of Integrated Care Systems and the expectation that NHS foundation trusts will collaborate with their system partners.

We are taking the opportunity of this consultation to seek your views as part of a wider conversation about how the role of NHS foundation trust councils of governors should continue to evolve within Integrated Care Systems and what further support may be required.

Why your views matter

Feedback from the consultation on the draft Addendum will be taken on board in readiness for the publication of the final version in Summer 2022.

We will use your answers to the wider questions about the evolving role of NHS foundation trust councils of governors to plan further work to be undertaken in 2022/23 to support NHS foundation trust councils of governors to continue to adapt to system working and collaboration.