NHS Cornwall and Isles of Scilly and NHS Devon established joint working arrangements in September 2025, as part of national NHS reforms to reduce the running costs of integrated care boards (ICBs).

All ICBs in England have been asked to significantly reduce costs and shift to a more strategic role with different responsibilities for them and other parts of the health and care system.

This requires some ICBs with smaller populations – including NHS Devon and NHS Cornwall and Isles of Scilly – to work more closely with other ICBs in a ‘cluster’.

‘Clustering’ means that, although both individual ICBs will continue to exist, they will work as one – with a single Board, leadership team and staffing structure.

Both organisations will continue to be individual sovereign legal entities until the point of formal merger (expected April 2027).

To ensure effective and cohesive governance oversight of the Cluster arrangements, both organisations have delegated their current Board’s responsibilities into a joint committee arrangement.

The Board committee is chaired by John Govett and includes executive and non-executive members from across both counties.

The absolute priority remains to serve the population in the best possible way, working closely with, and remaining accountable to, all local health and care partners.

For more information – including Board members, meeting dates, papers and stakeholder updates – please visit the dedicated cluster website.