20.03.11
NHS redundancies in the North cost £30m
Making NHS managers redundant is costing almost £30m across north and north east Yorkshire – with many of these staff expected to be rehired for roles in the new Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs).
A total of 478 staff were handed ‘exit packages’ across the area last year, with an average payout of £60,000, costing a total of £28.52m.
The bill for County Durham was £5.75m, the second highest in the country after Camden which spent £6.3m. Three other northern trusts were among the top ten.
The cost of redundancy across England reached £168m in 2010-11, and the full cost is expected to be £1bn after Strategic Health Authorities are disbanded.
Phil Wilson, Labour MP for Sedgefield, told the Northern Echo: “Many of those made redundant are being re-employed by the new commissioning consortia, only weeks after receiving massive payouts.
“The Government talks about reducing bureaucracy, but all it is doing is replacing one bureaucracy with another. It is bureaucracy gone mad.”
However, minister for health Simon Burns said: “The short-term costs are dwarfed by the £4.5bn that we will save over the course of this parliament and £1.5bn every year after that. Our planned cost for NHS reform remains the same as what we published in the impact assessment in September.”
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