CAMPAIGNERS demanded safety investigations be opened into 101 hospitals built using controversial PFI funding yesterday, after the first facility built under the scheme was exposed as a shoddily-constructed death trap. Cumberland Infirmary in Carlisle has been forced to replace what fire service officers say are sub-standard fireproofing materials installed by private developers Health Management Carlisle Ltd when it was thrown up 15 years ago.

Fire Brigades Union officials described the hospital as “the biggest fire risk in Carlisle” and North Cumbria University Hospitals (NCUH) NHS Trust has admitted the fire risk has been “wholly unacceptable.”

Patients will be housed in portable cabins during remedial works which will take up to 18 months.

The fireproofing problem is just the latest in a catalogue of issues at Cumberland. In January it was hit by the outbreak of a novovirus linked to standards of cleaning — again the responsibility of privateers. And in 2013 and 2014 it was among hospitals singled out by the Government’s Care Quality Commission (CQC) because of its high death rates.

Other problems include design flaws which make the hospital’s upper floors unbearably hot.

There is good reason to think that Cumberland’s PFI problems are replicated elsewhere, Health Emergency director John Lister warned yesterday. “For 15 years now there have been concerns over the quality of building produced by PFI consortia concerned above all to generate a swift profit for their shareholders,” he said. 

Mr Lister explained PFI hospitals have been squeezed into inadequate sites, and built to minimum standards to cut costs. “It’s clear that at least some of the building firms skimped on materials, while planners left out air conditioning and made no effort to learn from design mistakes that had just been made elsewhere,” he said.

“If some building materials in the Cumberland Infirmary are found to be below safety standards, there should be an audit of other first and second wave PFI hospitals to ensure that any such dangers are addressed without delay — with the bill for any repairs or rebuilding handed to the consortium.”

Cumberland’s problems with high temperatures also exist at hospitals in Edinburgh and Norfolk, Mr Lister said.

Keep Our National Health Service Public spokesman Alan Taman said PFI privateers appeared to be immune from prosecution for their bodged work, and were allowed simply to “take the money and run.” As with all PFI facilities, the cost to the NHS and the taxpayer of building and maintaining Cumberland was relatively small initially, but has since grown to huge proportions.

The Trust says the hospital cost £67 million to build in 2000, but it has since had to pay £23m every year in loan repayments — 10 per cent of its budget — increasing to more than £35m a year by 2030. 

Debts mounted so high last year that the Trust was forced to take a £47m government bailout — and the final cost will reach more than £600m.

NCUH chief operating officer Helen Ray said that for the last three years the trust had had “deep concerns” about the maintenance of the hospital by privateers. She said: “This is not the first time we have uncovered such major flaws in the service provided to us through our PFI partner, and the Trust Board remains very deeply concerned that the current arrangements are not providing the high standards of service we require for our patients in North Cumbria on a consistent basis.”

No-one from Health Management Carlisle Ltd was available to comment.