A Local Government Association review found the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board was operating as a “passive meeting” and a “missed opportunity”, prompting proposals for significant changes to its membership and terms of reference that were considered by a county council committee on 22 October 2026.
Proposals to reshape the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board — including expanding its membership and giving it a central role in producing a new Neighbourhood Health Plan — were considered by Kent County Council’s Selection and Member Services Committee on 22 October 2026.
The paper, brought by the Leader and Cabinet Member for Public Health, Linden Kemkaran, and Director of Public Health Dr Anjan Ghosh, followed a review of the Board led by the Local Government Association (LGA).
Review findings
The LGA review, which included interviews with key stakeholders and a workshop, produced a stark assessment of the Board’s current performance. Among the challenges identified were that “the Board is not functional and needs to change” and that it was “a passive meeting”. The review found it was “a missed opportunity, is too transactional, and needs the right people having impactful conversations to effect change”. It also found that “the purpose of the Board is unclear, with no consensus on what good looks like”, and that “the Integrated Care Partnership has taken the lead in areas the Health and Wellbeing Board should be leading”.
The review also noted that health inequalities across Kent were “stark, with significant disparities”, and that coastal communities experienced “disproportionate ill health and inequality”.
Proposed membership changes
Officers proposed a number of changes to the Board’s membership. These included adding the Kent County Council Corporate Director of Growth, Environment and Transport; three representatives of local Health Alliances; a representative of district, borough and city chief executives; a representative of the VCSE Alliance; and a representative of the Kent and Medway Adult Safeguarding Board. The number of local elected members on the Board was proposed to increase from three to four. Three NHS provider trust members were also proposed — one from an acute trust, one from the mental health trust, and one from the Community Health Trust.
Neighbourhood Health Plan
The Department of Health and Social Care’s Neighbourhood Health Framework requires the Health and Wellbeing Board to lead the development of a Neighbourhood Health Plan for implementation from April 2027. The plan is expected to cover how NHS objectives will be delivered, how neighbourhood health will support goals around inequalities, and how local initiatives such as family hubs, housing and employment support align with neighbourhood health. Officers noted that neighbourhood health plans were expected to be made a statutory requirement “in due course”.
The committee was asked to endorse the proposed changes and to recommend to full County Council that the revised Terms of Reference be approved. The item had previously been withdrawn from the committee’s September 2026 meeting because proposed changes had been linked to Local Government Reorganisation arrangements that were placed on hold.
The council had not published the minutes of the meeting at the time of writing, so the committee’s decision is not yet on the public record.
Sources
- Kent County Council — Selection and Member Services Committee, 22 October 2026 (agenda and papers)
- Development of the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board and Terms of Reference — report to Selection and Member Services Committee (Kent County Council, October 2026)
- Appendix 1: Proposed Governance Arrangements and Terms of Reference for the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board (October 2026)
Top image: illustrative, computer-generated. Illustrative image generated by AI. This is not a photograph of any real Kent council chamber or meeting room.