Crackdown on NHS bureaucrats costing taxpayers £2.8billion a year: Health Secretary Steve Barclay launches plan to eliminate waste, wokering and deadwood to cut costs and free doctors from red tape amid backlog crisis
- He will reveal that 18,600 people work on the NHS governing bodies
- It’s more than double the 9,000 in 2013, with 5,000 added since Covid-19
- A further 26,000 work in the NHS’ local Integrated Care Boards, which cost £1.1billion
The Health Secretary is set to crack down on NHS bureaucrats who are costing taxpayers £2.8billion a year today.
Steve Barclay will shine a spotlight on ‘waste and wokery’ to clear dead wood and put more managers in frontline NHS trusts.
This means they can take over some of the administrative work currently done by doctors and nurses and free them up for patient care.
Mr Barclay will reveal that 18,600 people work on national NHS governing bodies – none of whom provide patient care – at a record cost of £1.3billion each year.
It’s more than double the 9,000 in April 2013, adding 5,000 since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
A further 26,000 work in the local NHS Integrated Care Boards – which in turn do not provide patient care and cost an additional £1.1billion. A further 7,000 works in Commissioning Support Units costing £400m.
Steve Barclay will shine a spotlight on ‘waste and wokery’ to clear dead wood and put more managers in frontline NHS trusts
The findings come from an audit of all NHS governing bodies ordered by Mr Barclay on the day he became Health Secretary.
It follows the plans of his predecessor Sajid Javid, who in June ordered the NHS to cut “diversity and inclusion” managers as part of a crackdown on “waste and labour”. Mr Javid said their salaries of up to £115,000 could be better spent on the front lines.
In a major speech today, Mr Barclay will say: “Having so much management distracts the front lines.
“Some community nurses spend half their time on administration and the managers we have in the NHS have to work with them and help them, rather than creating more paperwork.”
NHS England employs 10,117 of its 18,600 full-time staff. The other four national governing bodies are NHS Digital, Health Education England, the NHS Trust Development Authority and Monitor.
Mr. Barclay has already announced a crackdown on consulting costs, promising to reduce the use of consultants by up to 80 percent.
He will now launch a plan to release detailed ‘maps’ of all national NHS agencies so taxpayers can see what the 18,600 staff are doing. A Department of Health and Social Care map will be released in the coming days and the remaining national bodies are being asked to release one by the end of this month.
The NHS announced in July plans to cut up to 6,000 jobs in what is now understood to be a “starting point”.
The NHS announced in July plans to cut up to 6,000 jobs in what is now understood to be a “starting point”.
At the time, NHS England chief executive Amanda Pritchard told staff the changes would eliminate frustrations over “the complexity and bureaucracy that characterize some parts and activities of our organisation” and save up to £1billion. The Daily Mail revealed last month that the NHS has spent more than £1million on hundreds of ‘woke’ staff networks at a time when it desperately needs more money for patient care.
Almost 500 of these groups have been set up by health foundations across the UK – they take up 36,000 hours of staff each year.
Questions have also been raised about how NHS money is being spent as waiting lists for routine hospital care hit 6.7million last month – another record high – despite a £12billion increase funded by increases in the national insurance tax.
John O’Connell, Chief Executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Taxpayers will welcome this moratorium on middle managers. Patients are fed up with money being wasted on unnecessary side jobs instead of funding frontline care.
“The Government cannot expect taxpayers to keep paying Health and Social Security contributions just to line the pockets of backroom NHS bureaucrats.”
