A hard-hitting report by the UK’s Public Accounts Committee has said that the health service is in a 'perilous state' despite getting an extra £1.8bn for social care in last year’s budget. According to a Daily Express report, it comes after Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt floated the idea of hiking National Insurance contributions to bring in an extra £4bn a year for health and social care spending.
But the problems of controlling cash flow in the National Health Service (NHS) was highlighted at a hearing of the committee yesterday when NHS CEO Simon Stevens and finance director Paul Baumann admitted that they were having to try to reclaim money off GPs for failing to provide the service they were paid to do. The two senior executives told committee members that they had to reclaim £260,000 from GPs for failing to review cases they had charged for.
Stevens welcomed the proposals for extra funding from Hunt and said the NHS has already contributed £27bn to dealing with the deficit with below average increases in spending. He also confirmed he has had regular conversations about money and other issues with Hunt.
The report says Stevens told the committee: “Over the course of that 70 years NHS growth has been around 3.7% a year but in recent times it has been under two.” He said that it had been a “feast and famine” approach over its history. The NHS boss said: “If we want a functioning NHS we will as a country going to have to change that. Therefore, I welcome the notion of a five or 10-year clear funding commitment that will enable the NHS and the workforce to set out the clear improvements for cancer services, mental health services, new technology and innovation.
“Obviously, when that happens and whether that happens is a matter for Parliament and Government but if it happens the NHS will greatly welcome it.”
In its report the committee said the financial position of the NHS remains in a "perilous state" despite the provision of a £1.8bn rescue fund in 2016-2017. The Department for Health and Social Care, NHS England and NHS Improvement are "too focused on propping up the system and balancing the books" and failing to create a long-term plan to improve patient services, they said.
The report says Meg Hillier, who chairs the influential committee, called for "fresh thinking" to address the NHS budget crisis as demand for services continues to grow. She said: "The National Health Service continues to scrape by on emergency handouts and funds that were intended for essential investment.
"We have said it before and we will say it again: rescue packages and budget transfers are no substitute for a coherent, properly funded strategy that enables NHS trusts to plan, focus on patient care and lay the groundwork for long-term financial sustainability.
"Government's last-minute response to what were entirely predictable winter pressures is just the latest vivid demonstration of why fresh thinking is so desperately needed."
The committee's report warns the NHS has a "long way to go before it is financially sustainable", with trusts forecasting a deficit of over £900m in 2017-2018. While the Treasury announced £337m in additional funding in November, in part to cope with winter pressures, the MPs said this was "too late" for trusts to effectively plan how it would be spent.
They warned cash injections "paper over the cracks in NHS finances rather than achieve lasting improvement". The committee said: "We are disappointed that the department's lack of action means we have to repeat some of the same messages as our previous reports on the dangers of short-term measures used to balance the NHS budget and the risks of raising investment funds to meet day-to-day spending."
A Department for Health and Social Care spokesman is quoted in the report as saying: "As this report recognises, the NHS has made significant progress towards balancing the books and returning to a financially stable position.
"The Health and Social Care Secretary has acknowledged that funding for the NHS needs to be addressed with longer-term measures, rather than short-term, which the department supported in the Autumn Budget, giving priority to the NHS with an extra £2.8bn, on top of a planned £10bn a year increase in its budget by 2020/21."
[link url="https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/937352/NHS-crisis-Public-Accounts-Committee-warning-jeremy-hunt"]Daily Express report[/link]