NHS recorded £1.2bn surplus last year

18 Jul 13
There was a surplus of £1.2bn in the NHS in England in the 2012/13 financial year, the National Audit Office has revealed, exactly the same level as the year previously.

By Richard Johnstone | 18 July 2013

There was a surplus of £1.2bn in the NHS in England in the 2012/13 financial year, the National Audit Office has revealed, exactly the same level as the year previously.

Today’s examination of NHS finances concluded that, as the surplus was achieved ahead of reforms in April to abolish primary care trusts and replace them with Clinical Commissioning Groups, financial performance appears stronger in 2012/13.

However, auditors warned that there are also signs of ‘increasing pressure’ on hospital trusts, as they attempt to make £20bn of efficiency savings by 2015 under the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention programme.

More than 16% of hospital trusts, 25 of 151, were in deficit in 2012/13, and the report stated there are ‘substantial’ gaps between the trusts with the largest surpluses and those with the largest deficits. Two trusts had surpluses in excess of £20m, while three had deficits close to, or in excess of, £40m for the year.

When a comparison is made between regions, a similar pattern of variation is found between local health economies, the 2012/13 update on indicators of financial sustainability in the NHS stated. These differences are most marked in London, where PCT clusters in parts of west London had some of the largest surpluses, whereas those in the northeast of the capital had large deficits.

Around 23 hospital trusts in difficulty had to rely on financial support from the Department of Health in the year. But the NAO stated ‘it is hard to see’ how these transfers could be a sustainable way of dealing with growing demand for services, amid efficiency savings that will make financial pressures more severe.

• Also today, Professor Sir Mike Richards, the Care Quality Commission’s new chief inspector of hospitals in England, set out plans to reform how hospitals are examined. This follows a review of 14 trusts with higher-than-expected death rates, which lead to 11 being placed in special measures earlier this week.

Richards said he would lead a ‘significantly bigger inspection team’, which would spend longer in its examinations and covering every site that delivers acute services. These would look at eight key health service areas, including accident and emergency departments, maternity, paediatrics and care for the frail elderly.

Inspections will be a mixture of unannounced and announced, and will include specific visits at evenings and weekends.

After each inspection, hospitals will be given a performance rating of either ‘outstanding’, ‘good’, ‘requires improvement’ or ‘inadequate’.

Richards, whose role was created following care failings at the Mid Staffordshire hospital trust, said he would be ‘completely open about where good and bad care is being delivered’.

The new inspection regime will be tested in 18 trusts, Richards said, chosen to represent the ‘current variation’ of care, he added. By the end of 2015, the CQC said it would have inspected all acute hospitals. 

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