Shropshire Star

Huge bill for agency staff at Shrewsbury and Telford hospitals

Nearly £750,000 was spent on agency nurses at Shropshire's two main hospitals in a month because of sickness and a lack of staff, shock figures have revealed.

Published

The massive outlay last month forms a big chunk of a near-£2 million overspend on staff wages at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Telford's Princess Royal.

And it comes as the results of the 2014 staff survey at the two sites revealed one in five said they would not recommend the hospitals as a place to receive care, with a third saying they would advise others against coming to work there.

Papers due to go before a board meeting of the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust today show £17.75 million was paid out to staff in June at the two hospitals.

It says this was an overspend of £1.9 million against the budget – of which £734,000 was made up of employing agency nurses to prop up struggling ward staff.

In the report, chief executive Peter Herring said 45 health care assistants would join the trust in the next six weeks as bosses desperately try to cut ever-increasing costs on bank staff.

Mr Herring said: "The levels of cover for absences are in excess of budgeted levels, primarily in the areas of sickness, training and special leave, with a significant proportion of the cover then being provided at the agency premium.

"The pay bill continues to be above budget, this is predominantly due to high reliance on bank and agency across nursing and medics.

"Over recent months absence has been close to or achieving the target for the organisation as a whole.

"However, departments and wards within the organisation are experiencing much higher absence than the trust average, the highest area experiencing absence of 16.68 per cent.

"A number of inpatient wards have absence rates above 10 per cent. Budgets fund absence at four per cent therefore any absence above four per cent creates a cost pressure.

"In addition to high absence a number of wards are also carrying a high number of vacancies.

"Both factors create a high number of shifts that need to be filled – often this is through bank and agency. The premium cost is adding pressure to the pay bill."

The spend on agency staff is the main factor being blamed for an overspend of more than £4 million in the first quarter of the financial year 2014/15, with bosses warning today "corrective action" is required to avoid an annual £15m deficit.

Speaking about the staff survey, Mr Herring says in the report: "It is one of our key objectives to improve our employment.

"The recent friends and family test for staff showed an improvement with 81 per cent stating they were very likely or likely to recommend the trust as a place to receive care.

"This was a major improvement compared to the 48 per cent who agreed with this statement in the 2013 staff survey.

"In addition, 67 per cent stated they were very likely or likely to recommend the trust as a place to work whereas 47 per cent agreed with this statement in the 2013 survey.

"Whilst this is certainly not yet at the level we would wish it is a major improvement."

Sorry, we are not accepting comments on this article.