NHS bosses are asking for more than £200m to build 'two world class mental health super centres' in Bury and South Manchester.
Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust is bidding for £220m in government funding to build a mental health centre on the Fairfield General Hospital site in Bury, and a second centre in either Stockport or Tameside.
The Stockport or Tameside location will be known as the 'South Manchester campus', says the trust, making up £130m of the funding.
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The Bury centre accounts for the other £90m of the sum - and could involve purchasing 'around two acres of land'.
Together, the two centres would bring 'lots of different services into world class, modern facilities', according to the healthcare group.
In a statement shared this week, the trust said: "We have submitted funding bids totalling £220m to the government to build two world class mental health super centres.
"We’ve requested £130m to build a centre in Stockport or Tameside (location to be confirmed); this will be known as the South Manchester campus.
"We’ve also submitted a £90m bid to build a new centre on the site of Bury’s Fairfield Hospital. This would involve potentially purchasing around two acres of land from the Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust and making use of buildings they no longer require.
"The new centres would allow us to bring together lots of different services into world class, modern facilities.
"The government has committed to build 40 new facilities as part of their £3.7bn health infrastructure plan (also known as the new hospitals programme). They’ve already approved 32 schemes and are accepting bids for the final eight.
"We expect to be competing against a large number of bids from across the country (including Stepping Hill’s £500m bid for a new hospital). We are hopeful our schemes will be chosen, as they support our ambition to develop new facilities to benefit patients and staff."
Pennine Care runs mental health and learning disability services for children and adults in Bury, Oldham, Stockport, Tameside, Glossop and Rochdale.
In Tameside and Glossop, the trust also operates health improvement services.
Altogether, the trusts serves a population of 1.3 million people across Greater Manchester.
NHS chiefs say that building new centres will allow for the saving of millions as there will be need to 'maintain ageing facilities'.
"If we are successful, these new developments will offer improved quality of care and recovery rates, care closer to people’s homes (supporting the national target of eliminating out of area placements) and reduced length of stay and readmission rates," continued the statement.
"It supports our aim of providing a great place to work for existing staff, while also benefiting recruitment and retention. This will reduce reliance on temporary staffing, further saving money and improving quality.
"We also expect to save around £16m (£3m from the Stockport/Tameside development and £13m from Bury) mainly by not having to maintain ageing facilities and reducing rent on buildings we don’t own."
The chosen schemes are expected to be announced by the government in spring of 2022, with the trust saying it expects an update later this year.
