UKSF was asked to help Great Ormond Street Hospital (“GOSH”) in the successful delivery of Phase IV of its Masterplan. The Hospital is an international centre of excellence in specialist healthcare for children and receives over 240,000 patient visits each year. GOSH has been constantly evolving since it first opened within a Georgian townhouse in 1852 and was halfway through its ambitious 20 year redevelopment programme to rebuild two-thirds of the hospital site.

GOSH had significant plans for the replacement of the Frontage Building, the main hospital entrance along Great Ormond Street itself. A public consultation and children-led design work led the Foundation Trust to a grand scheme initially costed at £360m. UKSF was asked to consider innovative ways to work with the Trust and potentially fund this large infrastructure cost. GOSH receives essential support from a dedicated charity and has usually been able to deliver all of its capital works projects via a mix of charitable donation and NHS support. The size of the Phase IV works quite correctly meant that the Board of Trustees wanted to explore every avenue, however, in its funding to make sure that nothing had been missed.

UKSF undertook a thorough review of the capital plans and the funding requirements. This included identifying potential funding sources from both the public and private sectors and looking at operational structures that may have a financial impact upon the project. As an example, GOSH is unable to recover the vast majority of VAT incurred on its capital works expenditure and this made up £60m of the total Phase IV budget!

UKSF successfully identified a full range of funders and devised a suitable legal structure that would also allow the Trust to see the VAT reclaimed on the bulk of the build. This allowed GOSH to progress the Outline Business Case through demand & capacity modelling, safe in the knowledge that the financial support behind the project was robust.