The North Central London Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee met to discuss the NHS 10 Year Health Plan, winter planning for 2025/26, and an update from the London Ambulance Service. Councillor Pippa Connor, Chair of the committee, was scheduled to chair the meeting. Councillors Philip Cohen and Paul Edwards were also listed as attendees.

Winter Planning 2025/26

The committee was scheduled to discuss winter planning for 2025/26, including the NCL Winter Plan and the North London Foundation Trust (NLFT) Winter Plan.

The NCL Winter Plan outlined a commitment to:

• Improving vaccination rates
• Increasing the number of patients receiving care in primary, community and mental health settings
• Meeting the maximum 45-minute ambulance handover time standard
• Improving flow through hospitals
• Setting local performance targets by pathway to improve patient discharge times

The plan noted that winter 2024/25 saw lower A&E attendances and fewer ambulance conveyances per day compared to the previous year, which was thought to be a result of proactive demand management measures.

The plan also identified several initiatives to support urgent and emergency care pathways, including:

• Increasing vaccination uptake
• Primary care planning to undertake case review of vulnerable patients
• Enhancement of the Integrated Care Coordination Hub (ICC)
• Expanding the Mental Health Clinical Assessment Service (MHCAS)
• Working with the Metropolitan Police to embed the principle of using community crisis centres for mental health patients
• The Mental Health Crisis Pathway Improvement Programme
• Developing a set of principles and 'in extremis' actions to support sites in flow distress
• Refining existing policies and procedures to reduce impact of Infection Prevention and Control in ED

The NLFT Winter Plan included detail on:

• Keeping staff fit for winter, including an extensive staff health and wellbeing plan with wellbeing sessions and webinars.
• Keeping service users safe from winter respiratory illnesses, with the clinical team leading on delivering vaccinations to all eligible service users across NLFT.
• Consistent and effective patient flow, with NLFT's single Flow Team provision included in the plan. Operation Neva was scheduled to take place from 1 December with twice weekly Gold Groups to manage the operation, and Operation Equinox 2 was scheduled to run from 2 February to 5 April 2026 to ensure leave balances are managed effectively.
• Planning for, and utilising, schemes or winter funding effectively to meet NLFT objectives.

The NLFT Winter Plan also included detail on the Seasonal Influenza Vaccination Programme, Infection Prevention and Control, Adverse Weather, Industrial Action, External Disruption, and Emergency Planning.

NHS 10 Year Health Plan and Neighbourhood Health

The committee was scheduled to discuss the details of the NHS 10 Year Health Plan and Neighbourhood Health.

The NHS 10 Year Health Plan included three shifts:

• From hospital to community
• From analogue to digital
• From sickness to prevention

The plan set out how it would deliver:

• An end to the 8am phone queue
• Better dental access
• Faster emergency care
• Care closer to home through a new Neighbourhood Health Service
• A single patient record
• Care built around people via integrated healthcare teams working together in communities
• Upgraded IT
• Appointment booking and health management on the NHS App
• Investment in local health services with personalised care
• Expanded school mental health support
• Increased access to free and healthier school meals
• Creation of the first smoke-free generation

In March 2025, Integrated Care Boards (ICB) were asked to reduce running costs by around 50% and shift to a new role as strategic commissioner. To meet this demand, North Central London ICB agreed to merge with North West London ICB.

Neighbourhood Health was described as a way of delivering key elements of the NHS 10-Year Health Plan, shifting to proactive, preventative care, driven by data and communities, and focusing resources at those most at risk of ill health. Integrated Neighbourhood Teams (INT) were scheduled to do some of this work, with some of this work being done by the existing local health and care networks.

Integrators were described as a key part of driving Neighbourhood Health forward. They were not intended as replacements for existing Borough Partnerships, but would instead work with Borough Partnerships and provide the leadership, infrastructure and coordination needed to support integrated neighbourhood teams.

London Ambulance Service Update

The committee was scheduled to consider the performance update and achievements for London Ambulance Service (LAS) for 2024/2025.

The LAS update included:

• Answering 2,097,150 999 contacts
• Recruiting and appointing 1,077 people
• Treating 273,139 patients over the phone
• Seeing 1,084,922 patients
• Answering 2,006,609 111 calls

The LAS update also noted that in North Central London:

• The population is 1.4 million
• Barnet has the second-highest number of emergency attendances among boroughs
• Camden and Islington have some of the highest shares of under-35s among London boroughs
• There is a higher need in mental health services
• 30% of children grow up living in poverty
• Around 200,000 people are living with a disability
• Around 131,989 patients received face-to-face care in 2025 to date
• Almost 700 people work for LAS

Key achievements from 2024/25 included:

• 999 call answering average of 5 seconds
• 999 hear and treat rate of 20.1%
• Holding NHS 111 contracts in all five London ICBs including North Central
• Training over 17,000 London Lifesavers
• Co-designing the first Integrated Care Coordination Hub, which is located in North Central London

The LAS Winter Plan 2025/26 was built on year-round escalation planning focused on keeping patients safe, and supporting staff to deliver high quality emergency and urgent care. Key deliverables included:

• Improving ambulance response times for sickest patients
• Reducing avoidable ED conveyance by increasing 999 and IUC utilisation of Alternative Care Pathways (ACPs)
• Reducing handover delays
• Improving staff vaccination rate by 5%

The LAS was also seeking support for its London Heart Starters campaign, which fundraises to ensure there are an additional 150 public-access defibrillators in unlocked cabinets where they are needed most, and its London Lifesavers programme, which organises life-saving CPR and defibrillator training for communities, organisations and schools.