North Central London and North West London NHS to decide on merger

The move is a response to the government announcement of 50% cuts in operating costs for all Integrated Care Boards (ICB)

In statements released today, 18 July 2025, the two ICBs indicate they will meet separately on Tuesday and Wednesday next week. 

The Boards state that a range of options will be considered, including a full merger, which is the preferred option.

NCL ICB and NWL ICB have been working together in recent months to explore the potential benefits of operating at greater scale, with increased collaboration, in different forms, or a full legal merger into a new single entity, as the best ways to continue providing high quality services for patients and local residents. The options were examined and evaluated by each ICB against key criteria to explore how each would enable their own organisations to continue to provide high quality and robust services. The recommendation to both Boards is for full merger - NCL ICB, 18 July 2025

The Boards will consider a range of potential approaches including:

• Remaining as two stand-alone ICBs.
• Clustering where they remain two legally separate organisations with joint corporate functions.
• Merger where the two organisations legally merge to become a new single organisation with a single Board, CEO and Executive Team.

A fully merged NCL and NWL ICB would be the largest in terms of population size in England, serving 4.5m people, living in 13 London Boroughs (eight from NWL and five from NCL).