"Although few people seem to have fully grasped this at the time, the 22.6bn boost in last year's budget is being absorbed by inflation, higher national insurance contributions and pay rises including the 22.3% awarded to resident doctors restricting scope for spending elsewhere. The difficulties involved in the ambitious behind-the-scenes reorganisation that Mr Streeting initiated in the spring have also become clearer."
"The tight timetable for the 42 regional integrated care boards (ICBs) to reduce their running costs by 50% is in doubt, after bosses revealed that they cannot afford redundancy payouts. With half of NHS England's 15,000 staff also due to lose their jobs, as the organisation is merged with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), it appears that ministers promised an Andrew Lansley-style shake-up before coming up with a plan to deliver it and having previously ruled such a thing out."
The state of the health service is a central measure of government performance and Labour made NHS revival a core pledge. Frontline improvements have not yet materialised: hospital waiting lists, after six months of decline, recently rose, and staffing shortages and low patient satisfaction persist despite increased GP and hospital appointments. The £22.6bn budget boost is largely absorbed by inflation, higher national insurance, and pay rises, including a 22.3% award to resident doctors, limiting other spending. Ambitious reorganisation led by Wes Streeting has exposed difficulties: ICB cost-cutting timetables, redundancy affordability, and a merger of NHS England with DHSC risk large job losses and delivery gaps.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]