Job losses after budget overspend

From the archive, first published Monday 16th Apr 2007.

More than 22,300 NHS posts have been lost in the last 18 months, according to Royal College of Nursing survey.

Among the axed jobs are 1,100 at the Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust - which serves the Spen Valley.

The Trust had long-standing financial problems and overspent its budget by more than £30 million three years ago. That deficit has been halved to £14.6m for 2005/6.

The RCN's figures were revealed yesterday at the start of its annual conference in Harrogate when it said it was laying bare "the myth" that the NHS's debt crisis had been solved.

In its report entitled "Our NHS - Today and Tomorrow", the union described the deficits crisis as "real and entrenched".

The RCN report said almost three-quarters of newly-qualified nurses were still unable to find jobs and condemned "rushed, uncosted and untested" Government reforms.

Specialist nurses have been particularly hit hard.

The Government is predicting a small surplus overall for the financial year just finished, but the RCN said the cuts were harming patients.

The RCN's figure of 22,300 lost jobs comes after the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said in March that the number of people working in the NHS fell by 11,000 in the last quarter of 2006.

But the Government insists only 303 redundancies are clinical positions, such as those held by doctors.

Health Minister Andy Burnham said: "This RCN report presents an outdated and misleading picture. "It is simply wrong to suggest that 22,300 staff are losing their jobs.

"Whilst of course every redundancy is regrettable, the actual number of compulsory redundancies is 1,446 of which only 303 are clinical positions.

"We recognise it has been tough for NHS staff over the last 12 months, but we have now put the NHS on a sound financial footing for the future."