As NHS trusts continue to face funding cuts, and junior doctors strike over an ongoing dispute over pay, a petition calling on Rishi Sunak to end health service spending cuts is gathering momentum.
The petition was launched by an NHS nurse called Mathew Tovey, who warns that a return to austerity would mean that the NHS is ‘truly lost.’
“I’ve worked in the NHS for the past 12 years and over that time I’ve watched our services being cut away by successive governments. We cannot accept any more spending cuts – it’s not possible to provide the same level of health care with less and less every year,” says the nurse.
“We have already lost so much – NHS beds, appointments, operations, tests, and staff all cut to the bare minimum. The end result is where we are today: too many people waiting for treatment, whilst NHS staff are leaving in their thousands because we’re exhausted, traumatised and can’t pay the bills,” he added.
More than 441,500 people have signed the petition to tell Rishi Sunak no more cuts.
It emerged this week that North East London’s NHS (NHS NEL) has approved around £82 million in spending cuts in 2023. The NHS NEL refers to the cuts as ‘efficiencies.’ They will affect five hospitals and mental health trusts, which serve around two million patients.
Reports reveal that in a meeting last week, the NHS NEL board approved a spending plan that included £82m in cuts, so the health body can stay within the £4.2bn allocated to it by the government.
Henry Black, chief finance and performance officer at NHS NEL, described 2023 as “probably the most challenging” for NHS finances since the pandemic started.
NHS England had recently told NHS NEL to cut spending on its 756 staff by 30 percent over the next two years.
In response to the announcement, Marie Gabriel, chair of NHS NEL, said staff are “understandably concerned” about potential job losses.
Meanwhile, warnings have been made in the North East of England that funding cuts to the value of £160m are contributing to a “vicious circle of ill health.” Samantha Allen, chief executive of the North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care System, highlighted how changes to how NHS England funding is allocated which prioritise poor performance by NHS bodies rather than areas of poor health were keeping our region “anchored.”
A report shows that central funding for the NHS in the North East and Cumbria fell by more than £100m in the last two years, and an additional £60m reduction is set for 2024.
Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is a contributing editor to Left Foot Forward
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