N&N set to make job cuts

Managers at Norfolk's flagship hospital have conceded that "substantial" job cuts could be the only solution to its escalating debts, according to the Eastern Daily Press.

The 5,700 Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital Trust staff were warned earlier this week that a wide-ranging review was needed amid fears of a £22m funding shortfall - and on Friday the full extent of this review began to emerge.

It comes at a time of uncertainty across the National Health Service. The University Hospital of North Staffordshire announced it is to cut up to 1000 jobs and the Royal College of Nursing fears this is only the tip of the iceberg.

N&N chief executive Paul Forden said that it was quickly becoming clear "we will have to employ less staff than we currently do."

The hospital will not know exactly how bad the situation is until the Government finalises its grant settlement and a new staff pay deal is announced. Trusts have not yet been told when an announcement will be made.

In recent years the N&N has faced an uphill struggle to break even, already cutting back radically on the use of bank and agency staff and overtime, meaning there is little fat left to trim. Bosses have urged the Government to reconsider its latest financial settlementbut they now seem resigned to the fact this year will be the most difficult in the hospital's history.

Spokesman Andrew Stronach pointed out about 500 staff leave each year through natural wastage and it is hoped that by reviewing vacancies savings can be made. But this measure, along with restrictions on general spending on items such as stationary, has been in place for some time and more radical cuts are nowneeded.

Mr Paul Forden said: "We have an excellent track record of breaking even through strong financial management but the scale of the financial challenge next year is a very considerable one.

"Careful cost control alone will not be enough to deal with a projected £22million shortfall.

"Sixty per cent of our £300 million budget is spent on staff wages and that makes it inevitable that if we have to reduce our costs by £22 million we will have to employ less staff than we currently do.

"It is only very recently that we have received the funding information that projects our £22m shortfall next year and that means we simply don't know yet the specific areas of cost reduction.

"We will be pulling together a package of savings measures and we will belooking at everything we do, how we do it, why we do it, and making significant changes.

"We will be working closely with staff and their representatives, as well as patient groups, throughout this process.

"The situation has arisen because the Government looks set to increase spending for all hospitals by just 1.5pc, despite inflation costs for wages and medicine running at 6.5pc."

Ministers have also backtracked on a deal to pay an annual £3.8m "smoothing payment" on the hospital's controversial PFI deal.

This comes against a backdrop of debt across the country with the NHS expected to report a record overspend this year, projected in January to reach £790m.

Dr Beverly Malone, of the Royal College of Nursing, said: "We've seen a steady creep of these types of issues, from the freezing of posts to now we are actually talking about redundancies."

This could happen at any of the hospitals and trusts that are having deficits and, as we know, there's a number of them that are in deficit.

"The research shows that when there are not enough nurses in hospital that patients have more infections, more falls, more pressure sores and that their mortality rates goes up."

Health secretary Patricia Hewitt defended the Government's strategy saying situations, such as the jobs losses in Staffordshire, exposed inefficient hospitals.

She said such hospitals needed to learn from other trusts which have developed better administration and procurement regimes and adopted measures to reduce average length of stay in hospital, such as day surgery.

However forcing hospitals to do more on tight budgets without providing the necessary extra funds, while fire-hosing an unjustifiable £115 million a week at the wasteful European Union, is surely the behaviour that shouldn't be tolerated.