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Taking care in the public interest

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01 November 2018 / Nicholas Dobson
Issue: 7815 / Categories: Features , Public
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Accountable Care Organisations: a new model for the provision of health & social care? Nicholas Dobson reports

  • The proposals by the Secretary of State and the NHS for Accountable Care Organisations are lawful.
  • The policy development point has not yet been reached where the principles of transparency and clarity apply.

What are Accountable Care Organisations (ACOs) and why should public lawyers be interested? Perhaps because on 5 July 2018 Green J gave an important judgment on what he thought was ‘an issue of great public interest’. This was whether the Secretary of State and NHS England could lawfully introduce the ACO as a new model for the provision of health and social care.

A House of Commons Briefing Paper (issued 6 July 2018) indicated that an ACO is ‘an area-based model of healthcare provision, where a single body takes responsibility for the health needs of its entire population’. According to the paper, ACOs usually involve one or more providers collaborating to meet the needs of a defined area and taking responsibility

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