Financial headache at Bolton trust must not affect patient safety
The financial crisis facing some of our hospitals has been widely reported in recent weeks, with a trust in London even being put into administration its economic health is so bad.
With that mind, it was worrying to read last weekend about the discovery of a £5 million black hole at Bolton NHS Foundation trust. According to the Telegraph, the revelation was followed by the dismissal of the trust's chairman.
Bosses at the trust have admitted that they now have a £1.9 million budget deficit and have already put in place a recruitment freeze and are calling for voluntary redundancies in a bid to slash the wage bill.
As the trust gets to grips with the challenging financial landscape it is now facing, the clinical negligence solicitors at JMW are urging it to ensure that front-line services that are essential for patient safety are not affected. The trust has already said publicly that this will not happen, but as the scale of the deficit begins to bite, it may find cutting patient services difficult to resist.
The Telegraph reports that the trust originally believed it would end the financial year with surplus funds, which if correct, shows a frightening mis-management of public money. The patients who rely on the healthcare provision of Bolton NHS Foundation Trust are the innocent victims in this debacle and must be protected.
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