Skanska ID owns 50% of the project company, and Innisfree holds the other 50%, with Skanska UK as our construction and Hard FM partner. Construction is worth around £174 million (SEK 2.4 billion), and the facilities management contract is worth around £2.3 million (SEK 30 million) a year for the entire period.

According to ID UK’s development director for healthcare, Martine Gagnon, the scheme will provide up-to-date facilities to enable the delivery of quality healthcare to the Walsall community.

She says: “The hospital site had grown in an unplanned way over the years, and our solution is based on an integrative design that links the different elements to create a single, unified hospital.

“The redevelopment will result in the replacement of outdated buildings with substantial new facilities.

"These include a modular, 136-bed ward block to add to 422 existing beds, a new state-of-the-art Diagnostic and Treatment Centre, a new Women, Children and Young Person’s Unit, and a Multi-Purpose Education Centre.”

Preparatory work worth about £30 million has already been completed and main construction has now begun, with all new accommodation set for delivery in Autumn 2010, and full completion in the Summer of 2011. All existing healthcare facilities will remain fully operational throughout construction.