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NHS savings...Who is getting the first hand benefits ?
Sniffle774
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So what's happening here ? More government lies ? NHS unable to manage its own success ? A little of column A and a bit of column B ? Either way I am sure Mr Lansley will be keen to get to the bottom of this, after all, he said one thing WILL happen...and it's not.
The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Andrew Lansley):We delivered £4.3 billion of cost improvement in the NHS in the last financial year. We are aiming to do more this year. We delivered £2.5 billion, according to the deputy chief executive of the NHS, in the first two quarters.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns): Any and all money made by the NHS is returned straight into care, not to the Treasury.
Over the last financial year the NHS underspent by £1.7bn and the Treasury clawed back £1.4bn of that. Indeed, HSJ (paywalled) say that:
The spokesman also confirmed that the DH recorded a £1.9bn underspend in 2010-11 – but made no use in that year of the “budget exchange” scheme which allows government departments to carry over some unspent funds for use in future years. This means at least £2.9bn of DH funding has been clawed back by the Treasury in the past two years. This is despite the NHS facing a funding settlement for 2011-12 to 2014-15 that is likely to mean its “tightest four-year period in the last 50 years”, according to think tanks the Nuffield Trust and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
So over two years almost £3bn of NHS money has been clawed back by the Treasury for deficit reduction.
So what's happening here ? More government lies ? NHS unable to manage its own success ? A little of column A and a bit of column B ? Either way I am sure Mr Lansley will be keen to get to the bottom of this, after all, he said one thing WILL happen...and it's not.
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I'm sure he would be keen to do so...unfortunately for everyone Jeremy Hunt is now Sec of State for Health
Hehe....I knew that....honest., Well as long as someone does because it seems to me, reading that article, that savings are being made yet other areas need more cash. So, if this is true (pinch of salt etc) why are being told the NHS needs more cash cash etc to fix some parts when other parts are giving (having taken ?) back to the treasury.
Does that money go back to the treasury to be reallocated back to the NHS, in other words the saving are ring fenced, or is the NHS in its efficient parts being bled dry why the more inefficient parts being held up as evidence of its failings ?
Maybe, and I would not put that past many in the Tory party. However, thinking on this, I did wonder if trust a did save money and trust b needed more how would they move that money around. Now trust a could not 'give' it to them for reasons of accounting, auditing etc so maybe they would have to first return that as a savings to central government to the reallocate. Assuming, of course, savings are ring fenced, which I am curious about.
Step 1: Put the budgets in the hands of the GP's
Step 2 Start to cut those budgets incrementally.
Step 3 Allow GP's and others to start charging directly for provision of services. (get your credit card out just like the dentists).
In response people will have to start to take out private insurance policies to safeguard themselves.
I believe it is money the Department of Health have held onto by not dealing it out (or by placing stringent restriction on what a trust can use it for). From the inside it looks very much like the way the department of health (and/or SHAs) is handling the NHS budget is hindering the trusts in debt rather than helping.
So save cash and they're shafted, don't and they're screwed.