A meeting between Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen and an NHS group boss included a “good open conversation” about his pledge to build a new hospital on Teesside.

The mayor said in his re-election campaign he would step in and deliver a state-of-the-art hospital rather than see the University Hospital of North Tees “falling down” and costing millions of pounds a year to patch up. He admitted from the outset he had no control over the health services or role in the NHS or health provision, but said “the one thing I do know is how to deliver things, and I know how to build things and I know how to get things done”, and he planned an extensive consultation for a new hospital site.

Now he says he has requested a meeting with Health Secretary Wes Streeting. And Stacey Hunter, chief executive of the University Hospitals Tees health group, has said: “We’ve had a single discussion with the mayor and the chief executive of the combined authority.

“We had a good open conversation. I think at the moment the combined authority doesn’t necessarily have a remit in health, and I know that’s different and distinct from the mayor’s pledge.

“But clearly the current government are thinking through what more they want to devolve to mayors. It isn’t clear yet what that will mean. That’s a conversation that Ben Houchen is party to alongside the other mayors.

“We said we would absolutely, in line with what the NHS would be supportive of, be keen to explore any opportunities that there may be, as new things emerge under new government, to secure capital for much-needed investment for the Tees Valley,” Ms Hunter told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

She said there were important processes used by the NHS to make sure a plan was fit for purpose, right for local people and the best value for money: “For us we’re interested in working in a way that explores how might we unlock capital in line with the way the new government may determine it wants to do things. At the same time we’ve got to do that in a way that’s consistent with the checks and balances the NHS would want to have in place.

“That was the conversation with the mayor and the chief exec of the combined authority. We just said we would just see where that goes over the next few weeks, months, years.

“To be fair to the mayor, it’s really early days. Government are signalling further devolution but exactly what that will be, I don’t think anybody knows yet.”

NHS trust chiefs were told last year how the University Hospital of North Tees’ buildings – which had been labelled “not fit for purpose” leaking roofs and windows, broken ceiling panels and freezing pipes – had only eight years’ life left in them, A £380m bid to build a new hospital was rejected by the government in May last year.

Asked how the upcoming NHS diagnostic centre in Stockton, expected to open later this year, might help, Ms Hunter said: “It helps in respect of diagnostics, so tests and investigations. But it doesn’t change the fact that the biggest part of our infrastructure at North Tees which needs replacement are wards, theatres and intensive care.

“There are other things but the tower block, our most problematic part of the North Tees site, is still a significant risk. We have a genuinely held view that we’re going to have to have some significant investment to replace that ageing infrastructure.”

She said a new clinical strategy encompassing both North and South Tees NHS trusts was hoped to be finished by the end of the year, and they intended to do more work in communities: “But in our view it won’t negate the need for a new build of something in Stockton.

“I think the population need will always mean we need to replace that, because we’re going to need those secondary acute services [usually in hospitals] in play. I don’t think we can do enough through other things to avoid having to have that level of investment.

“It difficult because we understand that the financial environment everyone’s operating in is constrained. We’ll be doing what we need to do to try and influence that as best as we are able to.”

Lord Houchen said: “We have held a positive initial meeting on this and I look forward to continuing our work. I have requested a meeting with the new Health Secretary to see how we may work together to deliver this vital new hospital, and I look forward to speaking with him.

“I pledged to deliver this hospital during my term as mayor. We are four months into a four-year term and a project of this scale was never going to be delivered overnight. It took us two years to buy the airport, but we did it.

“It will take time to build a new hospital, but we will do it. Just look at my record of delivery.”