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Hospital in bid to save up to £15m
Kettering General Hospital is trying to cut up to �15m from its budget next year
Kettering General Hospital is considering asking staff to take five days unpaid leave in a bid to cut almost a 10th of its budget.
The hospital is also considering buying cheaper medicine and reducing the number of patients staying overnight before surgery as it tries to cut between £12m and £15m from costs.
Acting chief executive Mike Smeeton said: “The trust is considering a range of options to reduce costs and improve efficiencies.
“The potential for staff to take unpaid leave is an option that is currently being explored after having been suggested by one of our staff.”
Staff would still be offered the same number of days leave, but five days of it which are currently paid would be unpaid.
Other ways of saving money being considered include improving theatre productivity by increasing the proportion of cases treated as day cases rather than bringing people in for surgery the night before, reducing the number of cancelled operations and ensuring theatre lists start on time.
Outpatients and diagnostics are also looking at changes which could be made to scheduling arrangements to ensure best use is made of clinicians’ time and requests for diagnostic tests are processed quickly.
The hospital is working to ensure turn-around times for diagnostic tests are within Department of Health recommendations.
Spending on drugs can be made more efficient by ensuring that clinicians prescribe “generic drugs” rather than those issued by pharmaceutical companies under trade names, which cost more but are the same drug.
The trust is also examining its procurement and tendering processes to ensure it secures best value from suppliers without compromising on product quality.
Mr Smeeton said: “As a result of a variety of financial pressures Kettering General Hospital estimates it will need to make savings of £12m to £15m over the next year.
“This is because while nationally NHS funding has been frozen costs are going up, including things like inflation, VAT, pay awards, insur- ance payments, reductions in money the hospital receives for individual procedures and for providing its services to Northamptonshire NHS.
“As a result clearly the hospital is looking at a very wide range of suggestions and plans by its managers, departments, staff unions and individual members of staff on how these very challenging savings can be made.
“We are in the process of gathering these ideas, we will then evaluate them and cost them and then consult with our staff about them. It is much too early at this stage to say much more than this.”
Some staff have reacted angrily to the suggestion they should take unpaid leave.
A senior nurse, who has worked at the hospital for more than 15 years and who asked not to be named, said: “The feeling generally is that staff are being asked to bail out incompetent management.
“People are not happy. It’s too important for them to mess it up like this.
“Staff are not asking for very much. They just want a secure, reasonably paid job. That’s not too much.”
The nurse said she was given five extra days paid leave as an incentive to stay after serving the hospital for 10 years.
She said: “It’s a reward and we were all grateful for it.
“Then they come up with something like this. Some people won’t even be getting as much as me.”
Alex Wood, representative of union Unison at the hospital, said: “It’s a potential suggestion mooted.
“It has been presented to the trust board that the staff side would be prepared to ask members, but nothing more than that.”
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Thursday 23 February 2012
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Comments
There are 29 comments to this article
Page 1 of 2
artey
Thursday, May 5, 2011 at 07:42 PMbooboobear - story says that member of staff suggested it - good for them! You need to think yourself lucky you have a job - sounds like you think the world owes you a living. I've been asked for the last 2 years not to take holiday and also have taken a pay cut to keep my company going, we said yes. Wake up!! There is a recession on and the people in the private sector are fed up of your public sector moaning.
booboobear
Wednesday, May 4, 2011 at 05:50 PMkgh is becoming a comedy show with "SMEETON " the main star like many have said on here get rid of the idiots that control the "POT" and let the Dr's and Nurse's have there say then I think it will be a better place. the directors are aloud to purchase pink blinds and soft furnishings for there "offices" to suit there needs its a joke and a disgrace how they can do what they please then have a cheek to tell staff to have unpaid leave and make hard working long serving people redundant ! kgh = Joke
nhsskivvy
Saturday, April 16, 2011 at 09:16 PMWell said Dessa. I'm sure the likes of the chief exec and numerous head surgeons wouldn't notice a pay cut- not like the cleaners, Hca's and nursing staff would. The parents used to pay £1 for a meal at dinner time and £1 for a meal at teatime on the childrens wards, Depending on how busy the wards were over a 1 month period- the money collected would range from £70 - £110 every month, this was until the head of housekeeping decided to let the parents have FREE meals. Also the head of housekeeping was escorted off the premises 2weeks ago on FULL PAY. Just look at all the money that could be recouped there.
ruby123
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 08:48 PMOh dear tory 1 Labour 0. Best not mention your eye unless you can afford to go private, because the way things are going the NHS will be pulled apart by your 'winners' . I do not think that the last government was without fault but there comes a time when the coalition will have to stop blaming them. I went to KGH during the 80s and early 90s and it is a hell of a lot better now than it was then.
Tory's 1 Labour 0
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 12:57 PMCoalition's fault my eye! Everyone is suffering now because of 13 years of Labour's policy's of spend spend spend!! And what did we get for all this spending? Chuff all except heart ache now. As for KGH, it's been a while since I've had to go but hopefully it is a lot cleaner than it was, rubbish bags stacked up everywhere!!
RedBill
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 at 01:48 PMIt IS the coalitions fault.....Clegg sells his party 's soul for a poll on voting no one cares about let alone understands and Cameron and Co hates anything with a hint of socialism and thats exactly what the NHS is : Socialism in practice....we aint seen anything yet.
Albert Hall
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 at 11:26 AMMike Smeeton gets paid a heck of a lot of money doesn't he? Dessa is right, but these mid and top management people are not turkeys who vote for Xmas. They want to keep their well paid jobs at the expense of people at the sharp end, then they can make a political statement that it's all the Coalition's fault.
dessa
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 at 08:31 PMHere's an idea. Instaed of punishing the people who save lifes and make sick people better, why don't the management take a 15% pay cut each.....Better still get rid of the 5 levels of management, and just have a nurse manager, then the chief exec, that's it.....How much would that save?? Asking the important people, docs and nurses, to take pay cuts to save money but employ more people on high pay bands is so wrong. 40 inch flat screen t.vs in some managers offices so they can read their email better is a total waste of money. it's not rocket science, but clearly it is
annbren
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 09:16 PMThe KGH Trust have also told staff that the Bank Holiday in honour of the royal wedding is a normal working day... no extra pay or time off in lieu.
annbren
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 09:10 PMThis is why I'm tired of hearing the private sector saying they've had two tough years, and it's time the public sector suffered too. I've worked in both, and it's a hell of a lot tougher in the public sector. My husband has worked at KGH for 21 years, and the NHS for 30 years... he hasn't seen an effective pay rise for 9 years. We haven't had a holiday since 2006... (a week in a caravan in Wales). He is charged to park, with no guaranteed parking space, so if he visits another hospital such as Isebrook during his working day, when he gets back there's no parking available, so he pays again in the general parking. I could go on, but I'm just tired of moaning about our lot. I wish he'd just get out of the NHS altogether.
black5f
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 08:31 PMSorry, thats 12 hour.
black5f
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 08:30 PMIs is this retrospective then? My wife, a nurse, lost a weeks holiday last year because she couldn't take it because of staff shortages! And the after hours unpaid, and the courses she is force to go on and we pay! This is mental! I have an idea, wait for a sunny day, all the nurses go outside and sit in the sun until this idiot grows up! Maybe you could get rid of some of the clipboard people, I counted 7 the other day in 12 hour! Use email?
Ray Rodden
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 04:32 PMfrom what i hear they want to also make staff take a 2.5% pay CUT, this after the stealth pay cut they were forced to take when staff car parking charges were introduced. They have casualised the porter service, letting people go then remploying them on zero hour contracts. Remember, these are some of the lowest paid people in the county these jobsworths are attacking How can you have a loyal staff when you treat them like something stepped on in the street? Meanwhile, I bet managers are pouring over leaflets to choose their new company cars
RedBill
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 03:41 PMI see Smeeton quotes 'Pay Awards' as part of the rising costs. To Himself and his cronies I assume ? once ;Rentokill, Wakenhut or whoever start to run OUR hospitals no doubt further cuts will be needed to pay the brave new management tiers the millions they will need for all their exotic holidays......
KEVJS
Monday, April 11, 2011 at 03:07 PMWhat's the betting that if a porter suggested Directors and management taking a weeks unpaid leave, it would have been filed in the bin?
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