15 February 2002
After Health Secretary Alan Milburn invited bids to run four failing trusts this week, the managers' organisation said the service had no idea why organisations failed.
Staff shortages rather than management issues were the source of many hospitals' problems in the south of England, where all four trusts – Barnet and Chase Farm, Ashford and St Peter's Hospitals, Dartford and Gravesham and Portsmouth Hospitals – are located.
Of the remaining eight trusts given no stars last September, six will be spared management changes following significant improvements; a decision on University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire will be made after a Commission for Health Improvement investigation; and East and North Hertfordshire Trust's recovery plan is being revised.
Gill Morgan, the confederation's chief executive, said it was right to change failing management. But she added: 'The way we measure performance in the NHS does not diagnose why a hospital is failing, only that it has not met its targets. Making changes without analysing why a hospital has failed risks ending up with the wrong solution to the wrong problem.'
The franchises will run for three years from April. For now, only NHS managers with a proven track record will be considered.
All but one of the four trusts have recently appointed new or interim managers, whose future is now unclear.
Barnet and Chase Farm did not know how franchising would affect the appointment of its new chief executive, announced on February 8. The appointee, Paul O'Connor, an experienced NHS manager, could bid for the franchise.
Sue Jennings is favourite to win the franchise at Dartford and Gravesham Trust. Jennings, Dartford's acting chief executive, is also chief executive of the three-star Basildon and Thurrock General Hospitals Trust.
At Portsmouth, Alan Bedford may get the job after joining the trust last week as a short-term replacement for chief executive Mark Smith, who is joining the private sector at the end of the month.
PFfeb2002
