West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust has formally disclosed an £837.6 million contract with Dragados for the design and construction of its replacement hospital in Bury St Edmunds, providing the clearest contractual value yet for one of the New Hospital Programme's priority RAAC replacement schemes.
The procurement record was published on 23 October 2026 and identifies DRAGADOS SOCIEDAD ANONIMA as supplier under a call-off from a framework agreement. It gives an agreed contract price of £837.6 million excluding VAT and describes the work as the "Design and Construction of new West Suffolk Hospital".
The disclosure does not represent a new contractor appointment. West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust publicly announced on 30 July that contracts had been signed with Dragados and said the contractor would work with the Trust and New Hospital Programme to continue developing the detailed design ahead of construction.
Aerial CGI of the proposed replacement West Suffolk Hospital at the Hardwick Manor site in Bury St Edmunds. CGI: West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust.
Key Takeaway: The new information is the £837.6m ex-VAT contract value now formally disclosed through procurement records. It is a Hospital 2.0 framework call-off covering design and construction, but physical main construction has not yet been confirmed as started and remains expected between 2027 and 2028 subject to further approvals.
What the £837.6m West Suffolk Hospital Contract Record Shows
The Contracts Finder award record for WSFT - Capital - New Hospital Programme lists West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust as buyer and Dragados Sociedad Anonima as supplier.
The record gives an award date of 29 July 2026, immediately before the Trust's public announcement on 30 July, and records a contract period running to 1 December 2034. The notice was not published until 23 October, making the contract value a new public disclosure even though the underlying appointment had already been announced almost three months earlier.
The procurement is categorised as a call-off from a framework agreement, with the contract itself classified as works. The accompanying scope includes hospital construction alongside mechanical installations, engineering services, demolition and earthworks, foundations and road works, landscaping, building completion and systems-related classifications.
Those classifications indicate the breadth of the delivery role but should not be read as a bill of quantities. They do not establish that every listed activity represents a separately priced package within the £837.6m contract.
£837.6m Is Not the Same as the Hospital's £1bn–£1.5bn Cost
The contract disclosure also helps separate two figures that could otherwise be easily confused.
| Figure | What It Represents | Current Status |
|---|---|---|
| £837.6m | Dragados contract price disclosed in the procurement award record | Agreed price excluding VAT |
| £1bn–£1.5bn | Government cost estimate for the full West Suffolk replacement-hospital scheme | Whole-scheme estimate |
| £60bn | Wider long-term New Hospital Programme funding environment | National programme, not West Suffolk spend |
The government's New Hospital Programme implementation plan placed West Suffolk in a £1 billion to £1.5 billion total cost band, a position maintained in the programme's 2025–26 annual reporting.
That wider figure is not directly comparable with the Dragados contract price. Major hospital programme costs can extend beyond a principal contractor appointment into client-side costs, programme assurance, equipment, digital systems, retained risks, contingency, inflation and other project expenditure.
The published procurement record does not provide a complete cost breakdown identifying which of those items sit inside or outside the £837.6m. LCM therefore does not treat the difference between the two numbers as evidence of either an overrun or a reduction in the hospital's wider programme cost.
Dragados Is Appointed, but Main Construction Has Not Yet Started
The contract value is substantial, but the physical project stage remains earlier than the procurement figure alone might suggest.
West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust said in July that the Dragados appointment allows the programme team and contractor to continue developing detailed designs ahead of submitting the Outline Business Case.
The Trust's wording is explicit that construction remains subject to the necessary approvals and is expected to begin between 2027 and 2028. There is therefore no basis for describing the October £837.6m disclosure as the start of £837.6m of physical construction.
The government also recorded West Suffolk as being in Outline Business Case development in its latest New Hospital Programme annual report.
The long contract period through December 2034 should similarly be read as the duration of the contractual arrangement rather than evidence that continuous physical construction runs for more than eight years. Design development begins before the main works, while commissioning, handover and other contractual obligations can extend beyond the principal construction period.
Reserved Matters Planning Is Still Progressing
The new hospital is planned for the Hardwick Manor site next to the existing West Suffolk Hospital in Bury St Edmunds.
Outline permission was granted in 2023 under hybrid planning application DC/22/0593/HYB, establishing the principle and broad parameters of the replacement hospital development.
The Trust subsequently submitted reserved matters application DC/26/0647/RM in April 2026, covering appearance, landscaping, layout and scale for the new hospital, together with car parking, associated infrastructure, the structural landscape buffer, temporary construction compound and demolition of existing hospital buildings.
That means the scheme should not be described simply as having completed planning. Outline permission is established, while the detailed Reserved Matters process continues alongside design and business-case development.
Hospital 2.0 Moves From Programme Policy Into a Live Project
West Suffolk is also significant because it is one of the first projects being taken forward through the New Hospital Programme's Hospital 2.0 Alliance model.
Dragados says the hospital will adopt platform-based design and standardised components in line with Hospital 2.0 principles. The aim is to increase consistency and adaptability while allowing the hospital to respond to local clinical requirements.
The contractor had previously been selected as one of the construction partners within the Hospital 2.0 Alliance before being paired with West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust.
The model is intended to move away from procuring every major hospital as an entirely bespoke development. Standardised designs, shared technical products and longer-term relationships with contractors are intended to create repeatable delivery across multiple schemes.
LCM examined that wider programme structure in £60bn Hospital Programme Opens New Era for UK Construction, including the potential for repeatable design, supply-chain investment and specialist capability to develop across the hospital pipeline.
West Suffolk Is One of the Priority RAAC Replacement Hospitals
The project is part of the priority group of hospital replacements affected by reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete.
Government programme documents classify West Suffolk as a RAAC hospital and place its expected construction start in the 2027–28 window. Dragados says the replacement facility will permanently remove the RAAC-related structural risks associated with the existing estate.
That replacement programme sits alongside continuing inspection, maintenance and mitigation across the existing NHS estate. LCM's RAAC Remediation 2026–2027: The Next Public Estate Workload examined how replacement hospitals, structural monitoring and interim mitigation are creating parallel workloads rather than a single RAAC construction programme.
The £837.6m Scope Points to a Broad Construction Package
The procurement classifications attached to the Dragados award extend well beyond a basic building shell.
They reference hospital construction, demolition and earthworks, landscaping, engineering services, mechanical installations, foundations and road construction, building completion, project-management-related services and systems work.
For contractors and specialist suppliers, that breadth indicates the scale of the eventual delivery chain required around West Suffolk: structures and envelope packages will sit alongside substantial building-services, external-works, infrastructure, fit-out, commissioning and healthcare-specific requirements.
However, the classification codes do not establish individual package values or prove that specialist clinical equipment, loose furniture, medical technology or every software system sits within Dragados' £837.6m contract. Those boundaries remain commercially important as the detailed design and business case develop.
What Happens Next at West Suffolk Hospital?
The immediate construction story is therefore not a site-start announcement but the progression from contractor appointment into detailed design, approvals and commercial definition.
The Trust must continue progressing the Reserved Matters application and Outline Business Case while working with Dragados and the New Hospital Programme on the developing design. Further programme and government approvals remain relevant before the full physical construction sequence can proceed.
The government's current New Hospital Programme timetable places West Suffolk in the 2027–28 construction-start window, while the wider scheme remains in the £1bn–£1.5bn cost band. The newly published procurement record now adds a more precise commercial figure to that picture: an agreed £837.6m ex-VAT Dragados contract under the Hospital 2.0 framework call-off.
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