{"id":172533,"date":"2025-06-10T08:57:34","date_gmt":"2025-06-10T08:57:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/172533\/"},"modified":"2025-06-10T08:57:34","modified_gmt":"2025-06-10T08:57:34","slug":"health-secretarys-cut-agency-spending-letter-lands-with-a-thud-in-shropshire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/172533\/","title":{"rendered":"Health secretary\u2019s \u2018cut agency spending\u2019 letter lands with a thud in Shropshire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Health secretary Wes Streeting has told NHS trusts including Shropshire Community NHS Trust<\/a> (Shropcom) that they \u201cmust reduce their spend on agency staffing by at least 30 per cent in the next financial year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Streeting and Sir James Mackey, chief executive of NHS England, say in the letter dated June 2 that if they \u201cdo not feel that sufficient progress is being made by the autumn, we will consider what further legislative steps we should take to ensure that use of agency staff is brought to an end”.<\/p>\n

\"HealthHealth Secretary Wes Streeting. Photo: Gareth Fuller\/PA Wire<\/p>\n

The Government wants to \u201celiminate agency use altogether by the end of this government\u2019s term of office.\u201d<\/p>\n

The message was heard at a board meeting of Shropcom held at the Memorial Hall in Oswestry<\/a> on Thursday (June 5).<\/p>\n

Simon Balderstone, Shropcom\u2019s interim workforce operations director, told the board that they spent \u00a3247,000 on agency staff in April to cover 49 working shifts. These include for dentists, medical staff and healthcare assistants.<\/p>\n

Agency spending accounts for 3.2 per cent of Shropcom\u2019s total pay bill and these part-time workers are used to cover for long-term sickness, maternity leave and vacancies.<\/p>\n

Board members noted a \u2018success\u2019 in reducing agency spending from \u00a3282,000 in April 2024 to \u00a3228,000 in March 2025.<\/p>\n

Even though the April 2025 figure was higher than March it was still \u00a335,000 less than they had budgeted for. Board papers say this was \u201cdue mainly to the skill mix of agency staff utilised being weighted towards the lower pay scales”.<\/p>\n

The board has been told that both agency usage and the use of bank staff will \u201cneed to remain within planned levels to deliver the financial plan”.<\/p>\n

The agency spending target for the trust in the whole of 2025\/26 is \u00a32,939,000, or 3.2 per cent of Shropcom\u2019s total pay budget.<\/p>\n

Board members were told that in 2025\/26 Shropcom overall will have to hit \u00a35.4m cost reductions plus the equivalent of \u00a31.7m in \u2018productivity improvements\u2019.<\/p>\n

\"AndrewAndrew Morgan was appointed Chair in Common of both ShropCom and The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) in October 2024. Picture: Shropcom<\/p>\n

There was no mention of any prospect of redundancies at the board meeting and cost reductions are being targeted on sharing services with other health trusts and local councils as well as finding new ways of working.<\/p>\n

Shropcom has started the financial year by posting an overall underspend for the month of April but executives were told that things would get more difficult as the year pans out and targets tighten.<\/p>\n

Patricia Davies, outgoing Shropcom chief executive, said it is a \u201creal challenge, and we have not had to deliver at this scale before”.<\/p>\n

\"PatriciaPatricia Davies, Chief Executive of Shropcom. Picture: Shropcom<\/p>\n

She added that changes being made are \u201csome of the most significant reshaping of the NHS nationally in a decade”.<\/p>\n

Andrew Morgan, the Chair in Common of both Shropcom and The Shropshire & Telford Hospitals NHS Trust, said all health service organisations have to make progress on reducing agency spending \u201cor the Secretary of State may be willing to change the law to enforce it”.<\/p>\n

Shropcom runs services across the whole of the county in a range of different locations. The trust runs four community hospitals \u2013 in Bishop\u2019s Castle, Bridgnorth, Ludlow and Whitchurch \u2013 as well as the Oswestry Health Centre.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Health secretary Wes Streeting has told NHS trusts including Shropshire Community NHS Trust (Shropcom) that they \u201cmust reduce…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":172534,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4316],"tags":[27607,105,4348,8823,379,12,29793,29794,285,380,8972,18713,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-172533","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-bridgnorth","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-healthcare","11":"tag-ldrs","12":"tag-local-hubs","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-north-shropshire","15":"tag-oswestry","16":"tag-politics","17":"tag-shrewsbury","18":"tag-south-shropshire","19":"tag-telford","20":"tag-uk","21":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114658243171991909","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=172533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/172534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=172533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=172533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=172533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}