He said a key priority for his committee this term was to develop a sustainable health and care system, with a review of the system’s delivery and funding set to take place.
This would include reviews of services that might be most effectively delivered by primary care, a review of medicines and the role of community pharmacies, a review of the secondary healthcare contract, and consideration of which services could be delivered most effectively by commissioning from the third sector.
Deputy Oswald said the ‘burdening cost’ of health and care dominated discussion within the States, particularly in the Treasury.
HSC acknowledged savings needed to be made, he said, and work was being done to reduce expenditure. Where possible, major patient operations were being carried out on-island, and a revision joint replacement scheme that used to be handled in Exeter was now being managed locally.
However, significant challenges were still being contended with, he said.
‘We have forecast the next rise in Health & Social Care budget year-on-year, if we do not change the way we deliver services, the figure that needs to be mitigated varies between £6m. and £8m. of extra resources required per annum,’ Deputy Oswald said.
He said approximately 60% of the net healthcare budget was spent on staffing costs, and attention had therefore been focused on reducing the use of ‘expensive’ agency staff.
Spend on such staff had ‘substantially declined’ in recent years, from approximately £16m. in 2023 to £12m. in 2024, with a further reduction of almost £3m. forecast for this year.
But Deputy Oswald said some service areas remained hard to recruit for, and the use of agency staff was still considerable in these areas.