04.05.12
Cuts warning for Hinchingbrooke
Hinchingbrooke will have to make radical cuts to meet the targets of the private company which now runs the hospital, Circle Healthcare, health unions have said.
Ali Parsa, the chief executive of Circle Healthcare, said it has committed to pay off £40m of public debt. The company aims to make at least £60m in profits from £1bn in NHS revenues, it is reported.
Circle will take the first £2m of any year’s profits at Hinchingbrooke, a quarter of surpluses between £2m and £6m and a third of surpluses between £6m and £10m. In the past decade the hospital has never made an annual surplus of more than £600,000, and this year the hospital is on course to lose £10m.
Parsa told the Guardian: “We are about saving a local hospital that was threatened with closure. It was on course to lose £230m over the next 10 years. We have to meet all sorts of outcomes in waiting times, A&E. We would not be able to do this if we cut. That’s not what we have done in other hospitals.”
But Christina McAnea, Unison’s head of health, said: “Circle and the Government promised that a profit would not be made until Hinchingbrooke’s debts had been paid off. It clearly had no intention of keeping this promise, having laid down plans to cream off nearly 50% of the hospital’s surpluses – making it virtually impossible to balance the books.
“This is a disgrace. Any surpluses should be going directly into improving patient care or paying off the hospital’s debt, securing its future for local people – not ploughed into making company profits.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Health said: “Any fee that Circle receives isn’t all profit – Circle must meet the ongoing cost of delivering the deal and indeed any costs they incurred in bidding for the contract.
“This process, which was started under the previous government, will deliver improved patient care and will put the hospital on a sustainable financial footing for the future.”
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