22.10.18
Struggling NHS hospital considers appealing to Tottenham Hotspur to ease financial struggles
A struggling NHS hospital is considering appealing to a Premier League football club for financial support after ending the year with a £29m deficit.
One option includes a 20p surcharge on food, drink and match programmes for fans attending Tottenham Hotspur home matches to help ease the financial strain at the nearby North Middlesex University Hospital.
The proposals in the trust’s board papers said the scheme could raise around £300,000 a year from 2020-21, based on around 50,000 transactions on each of the 34 match days at Tottenham’s new stadium.
The proposals describe a “transaction-based donation” featuring a 20p levy on league, domestic cup and European and NFL fixtures in a stadium with a capacity of over 60,000.
North Middlesex University Hospital said they hoped to use an “established relationship” with the Tottenham Foundation to reach an agreement on a domestic model without encroaching on their existing fund-raising activities.
The trust described the model as a “strategic charity relationship with Tottenham Hotspur FC,” and proposed a model similar to that used by large commercial and sporting venues, such as the O2 Arena where a transaction-based donation is a suggested addition to the cost of every food/drink order.
Back in 2016, leaked documents showed that the hospital’s A&E was at risk of closure over safety concerns, reported by the Guardian.
Internal documents showed that the General Medical Council and Health Education England said that they could take the unprecedented step of removing junior doctors from the A&E, forcing it to shut unless safety concerns were addressed within the month.
The CQC found serious failings in the hospital’s emergency care, rating them as inadequate, and found long delays due to a shortage of doctors.
And the trust is once again struggling financially, ending 2017-18 with a deficit of £29m.
In September, NHS trusts forecast a total combined deficit of £519m for this year, with NHS Improvement’s report saying that the projected deficit was “clearly unaffordable”.
Image credit - Lewis Whyld/PA Archive/PA Images
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