Norman Baker MP Member of Parliament for Lewes constituency
|Home
Contact Norman at:
Norman Baker,
23 East Street,
Lewes,
East Sussex,
BN7 2LJ.
Tel: (01273) 480281.
Fax: (01273) 480287.
Email: info
This website has been partly paid for from the funds made available to every MP to assist them in communicating with and representing their constituents.
Printed and hosted by Pipex Communications UK Ltd, Humber Buildings, Humber Rd, Beeston, Notts, NG9 2ET. Published and promoted by Norman Baker MP, House of Commons, Westminster, London SW1A 1AA. The views expressed are those of Norman Baker, not of the service provider.
Government should wipe off hospital debt in exchange for action to cut costs, says Norman Baker MP
Local residents will suffer markedly if the government makes the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals Trust pay off the debt that has been amassed. That’s the view of Lewes MP Norman Baker, who was speaking following a meeting at the Princess Royal Hospital at Haywards Heath with Peter Coles and Glynn Jones, respectively the Chief Executive and Chair of the Trust. He is now calling for the government to wipe the slate clean in return for the implementation of measures that will prevent future deficits from occurring.
The Trust has an accumulated historic deficit of £10m, and is likely to go a further £11.3 in the red this year. A "turnaround team" has been sent in by the government to find ways of cutting costs, and there are worries of significant job losses.
Norman Baker says: "We can argue as to why this large deficit has occurred. In my view, this is partly about money being siphoned away from the south-east to other parts of the country, partly about the pressures of an ageing population, and partly about bad management in the past.
"But whatever the reasons, what matters now is to get the ship back on an even keel, but to do so without damaging the service available to my constituents, and indeed those of other local MPs. Making the sorts of savings required to bring about a break-even point will be difficult, but having explored the options in some depth with Peter Coles and Glynn Jones, I feel reasonably sure that there are savings to be made that will largely limit the impact on front-line services. Even so, up to 325 jobs will go, 7% of the workforce, though I am assured that this is likely to be very largely through natural wastage rather than redundancies, and that the jobs in question will predominantly be managerial ones rather than front-line health professionals.
"If, however, the Trust were required to make up the accumulated deficit as well, that in my view would seriously affect the services the Trust’s hospitals can offer, and have a knock-on effect for the rest of the health economy locally, such as the Primary Care Trusts.
"I am therefore calling on the government to wipe off the £21.3m of overspend, in return for the introduction of measures to bring the Trust’s finances to break even. Generally speaking, it does seem rather perverse to see our local NHS in such tight financial difficulties at a time when there has never been more public money being invested in the NHS. People are entitled to ask what has happened to it all."
Norman also secured a pledge from the Chief Executive that the Trust remained committed to the Lewes Victoria Hospital, and did not intend to reduce its use of the hospital.