\n<\/p>\n
NHS bosses are seeking an emergency injection of \u00a33bn to cover unexpected costs and have warned ministers that without it patients will wait longer for treatment and hospitals will start rationing care.<\/p>\n
Their move presents a fresh problem for Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, as she tries to find ways to fill an estimated \u00a330bn hole in the nation\u2019s finances in her budget next month.<\/p>\n
Hospital chiefs said unless they received extra cash they would have to cancel weekend and evening sessions of surgery, which give patients who are stuck on the NHS\u2019s massive waiting list faster care.<\/p>\n
They also threatened to stop doing procedures of \u201clow clinical effectiveness\u201d, such as removing painful bunions, which can restrict mobility, because they are not a good use of limited resources.<\/p>\n
The \u00a33bn demand is needed to cover the cost of NHS staff redundancies, strike action by doctors and higher drug prices, and is likely to cause consternation inside a government that is desperately short of cash. The NHS is already due to receive \u00a3196bn of the \u00a3211bn health budget for England this year.<\/p>\n
Health service leaders argue that all three cost pressures they want the Treasury to cover were unexpected and have arisen since their funding settlement for 2025\/26 was finalised.<\/p>\n
Labour\u2019s pledge to cut NHS waiting lists will become even harder to deliver without the \u00a33bn, according to the NHS Confederation and NHS Providers, which represent health trusts, in what ministers are likely to view as a thinly veiled threat to scupper a key promise to voters.<\/p>\n
The waiting list for people in need of non-urgent care within 18 weeks remains stubbornly high. It stood at 7.6m procedures and appointments when Labour won power in July 2024. After falling for six months it has risen again in each of the last three months and stands at 7.4m, despite Labour\u2019s claim to have delivered 4m extra NHS appointments during its time in office.<\/p>\n
The NHS bodies\u2019 unprecedented joint plea will intensify already serious tension and infighting in Whitehall over who should foot the bill for an anticipated double whammy of redundancy payments and rising medicine costs.<\/p>\n
The NHS\u2019s 42 integrated care boards (ICBs) in England were due to make up to 12,500 of their 25,000 staff redundant by the end of the year as a result of health service cost-cutting, and Donald Trump\u2019s drive to lower prices in the US is expected to lead to an imminent rise in the cost of medicines.<\/p>\n
Reeves recently rebuffed a request from Wes Streeting, the health secretary, for \u00a31.3bn in additional funding for this year so that the ICB redundancies, which were meant to be completed by Christmas, could finally begin, according to NHS sources. She offered him only half that sum, \u00a3650m, and even that was conditional on his Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) agreeing to absorb the rising cost of drugs.<\/p>\n
The chancellor and Streeting are engaged in what one senior NHS figure called a standoff over the \u00a31.3bn. But the unknown cost of what higher drug prices would mean for the NHS is the \u201ccurveball\u201d that has been complicating negotiations, they added. Whitehall\u2019s behind-the-scenes row over NHS funding \u201cis all in a mess at the moment and needs to be resolved\u201d, the same source said.<\/p>\n
The two NHS organisations say the \u00a33bn they are seeking includes over \u00a31bn to cover ICB redundancy costs, that the five-day strike by resident doctors in July cost \u00a3300m, and that higher drug prices could lead to the NHS having to pay as much as \u00a32.5bn extra for vital medicines.<\/p>\n
Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said: \u201cThe threat from unbudgeted redundancy payments, higher drug prices and renewed industrial action risks derailing progress on key waiting time targets and the wider reforms that are essential to getting the NHS back on track.\u201d<\/p>\n
One NHS trust chief executive said additional operating theatre lists \u201care the easiest things to stop when money is difficult, but they have an immediate impact on waiting times\u201d. Hospitals would also do fewer \u201cprocedures which impact quality of life but aren\u2019t life-saving\u201d, they said. While bunions are very painful for those affected, they are not a life-or-death problem, they added.<\/p>\n
The ICB shake-up is a key element of the radical reorganisation of the NHS that Keir Starmer announced in March, including the abolition of NHS England, despite Streeting having explicitly ruled out restructuring the health service before last year\u2019s general election.<\/p>\n
Richard Sloggett, an ex-DHSC special adviser, said: \u201cThis \u00a33bn demand by NHS leaders is a dramatic intervention that leaves health ministers exposed. The rushed decision in March to announce a massive NHS reorganisation \u2013 without clear funding and plans attached to deliver it \u2013 has led us to this point. Add strikes and rising drug prices and the government is facing a perfect storm of issues on its number one public service priority.\u201d<\/p>\n
Daniel Elkeles, the chief executive of NHS Providers, defended the \u00a33bn demand. \u201cAs the government prepares its budget, it\u2019s time for an honest assessment and discussion about what the NHS can really achieve this year in these challenging financial circumstances, and about what is \u2018doable\u2019 to meet ministers\u2019 ambitions in their 10-year plan for health,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Conservatives have criticised Streeting over the bogged-down ICB overhaul. In the Commons last week, the shadow health secretary, Stuart Andrew, told MPs that Streeting \u201cis very good at making promises, but the facts are that he is presiding over a reorganisation that has stalled, creating uncertainty for staff\u201d.<\/p>\n
When Andrew challenged Streeting to set out how many NHS staff would lose their jobs because of the reorganisation, the health secretary said only that he knew of \u201ca number of expressions of interest in voluntary redundancy across my department, NHS England and ICBs\u201d.<\/p>\n
A DHSC spokesperson said: \u201cThis government has delivered a record-breaking \u00a329bn investment in our NHS \u2013 including up to \u00a310bn on digital and technology transformation and \u00a3750m for urgent capital repairs \u2013 demonstrating our unwavering commitment to properly funding the health service that we all rely on.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that needless strikes will divert money, time and resourcing away from the frontline. That\u2019s why the health secretary has urged the BMA to stop being selfish and start putting patients first.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, investment alone isn\u2019t enough \u2013 it must go hand in hand with reform. That is why we\u2019re doing things differently: not just fixing the NHS but moving it forward through our plan for change. And it\u2019s already working. We\u2019ve taken more than 200,000 people off waiting lists, delivered 5m more appointments and GP satisfaction is finally going up.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NHS bosses are seeking an emergency injection of \u00a33bn to cover unexpected costs and have warned ministers that without it patients will wait longer for treatment and hospitals will start rationing care. Their move presents a fresh problem for Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, as she tries to find ways to fill an estimated \u00a330bn hole<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[4329,522,115,807,333,8835,1229,1862,7242,1952],"class_list":{"0":"post-30770","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics","8":"tag-3bn","9":"tag-demand","10":"tag-extra","11":"tag-leaders","12":"tag-longer","13":"tag-met","14":"tag-nhs","15":"tag-times","16":"tag-waiting","17":"tag-warn"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}