28.10.14
NHS managers to be stripped of redundancy payments if rehired within a year
Redundancy payments given to NHS managers and other public sector workers will have to be repayed if they are rehired, under new plans announced by the government.
The new measure, included in the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill currently going through Parliament, will require individuals earning more than £100,000 who take a new job in the same part of the public sector within a year to repay all or part of their redundancy package.
According to the Treasury of the 19,000 NHS administrators made redundant between 2010 and 2013, almost 20% rejoined the NHS.
Figures also show that more than one in six managers and administrators given payouts worth as much as £650,000 are back working in the health service.
In one case an NHS executive and her husband were given pay-offs worth almost £1m between them, only for both of them to be subsequently rehired elsewhere in the health service.
Those that have been out of work for longer will have to repay less and it will only apply to those given new contracts, meaning that the vast majority of existing public sector workers are unaffected and will be able to keep any redundancy payments.
Chief secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said: “It’s only fair that highly-paid executives who receive a redundancy pay-out from the public purse and then quickly return to the same part of the public sector repay the taxpayer.
“Reforming the public sector so it works for Britain has been a key part of this government’s drive to create a stronger economy and fairer society.”
Writing in the current edition of our sister publication PSE, Paul McFarlane of the Employment Lawyers Association says the government has created confusion and set itself an impossible task with its proposals to claw back public sector managers’ exit payments. His article can be found here.
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