11:16am Wednesday 17th December 2008
Primary care trusts throughout the capital are being asked to stump up money to wipe out the debts of London’s cash-strapped health trusts. LINDA PIPER reports.
THE trusts, including Bexley Care Trust, are all holding board meetings in the next few days to give their approval to the scheme.
But Bexley’s trust will not be asked to make any direct payments to the scheme initially, because of its own poor financial situation.
It broke even for the first time in five years in 2007/8 and is still paying off its own historic debt of £10.3m.
Bexley is one of five trusts considered financially unable, at present, to contribute directly.
The others are Enfield, Hillingdon, Hounslow and Kingston.
Trusts which are not in financial difficulties will be asked to pay a 1.3 per cent levy for the next two years.
In Bromley, this translates into around £5.5m a year.
In addition, all the care trusts are being asked to give up their share of £304m due back to them from the London-wide kitty.
It is hoped this cash will be enough to wipe out the historic debts accumulated by both hospital trusts and primary care trusts and put London’s healthcare providers back on a firm financial footing.
The proposals were approved by both Bexley and Bromley trusts last week while Greenwich and Lewisham will decide this week.
If there is agreement across London, it will be good news for local hospital trusts.
Queen Mary’s Sidcup, Queen Elizabeth in Woolwich and the Princess Royal, Farnborough, are already consulting on a merger to create a single hospital trust across the three hospitals, from next April.
They hope the merger will help them save millions in running costs and help them attract and retain staff.
But one of the problems it faces is the millstone of a combined historic debt of £187m around its neck.
Lewisham Hospital, which will not be part of the new merged trust, also has a historic debt of £2m.
The other hospital trusts in the red are Whipps Cross and Barking, Havering and Redbridge Hospitals Trust, and Hillingdon Primary Care Trust.
The London trusts will set up a Challenged Trust Board, drawn from members of the 31 London trusts, to supervise and monitor the recovery plan.
IN A bid to equalise and improve healthcare across London and cut costs, the capital’s primary care trusts are planning to set up a new pan-London organisation.
The London Clinical & Business Support Agency will take on the critical tasks individual care trusts (PCTs) would find difficult or costly to do on their own.
These include providing a clinical evidence base and capacity modelling to enable PCTs to target their health spending and provide access to experts to enable them to achieve World Class Commissioning levels.
But it will cost £32m next year to set up the agency, rising to £36m and £37m in subsequent years.
Next year, PCTs will have to share £25.3m of the cost, with funding of £28.7m and £29.5m needed in the following years.
The agency expects to employ 360 full-time equivalent staff by the end of phase one, increasing to 560 by the end of phase three and plans to operate from its own three-floor premises.
The average cost per PCT will start at £820,000 rising to almost £1m by year three.
Bexley Care Trust will be expected to pay £640,000 next year rising to £740,000 in year three.
The agency’s board will be drawn from London PCTs with its own chief executive.
THE borough’s residents have been left “between a rock and a hard place” over healthcare changes proposed by A Picture of Health (APOH).
Health bosses are to press ahead with some of the plans to expand and create new services at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup.
A decision by APOH to reorganise hospital services in Bexley, Bromley, Greenwich and Lewisham has already been referred to the Health Secretary but the joint scrutiny committee of councillors from the affected boroughs agreed some plans were outside the scope of the referral.
At a meeting of Bexley Council’s own health scrutiny committee, Bexley councillors said the plan to press ahead with some developments created a difficult situation for Bexley.
Cabinet member for health Councillor Sharon Massey said they feared expanding the urgent care centre at Queen Mary’s Sidcup, could weaken the incentive to retain A&E at the hospital.
She said: “We want the best urgent care centre we can have, but at the same time we don’t want to make it easier for you to get rid of A&E.”
Cllr Massey said Bexley residents faced the same dilemma with plans for other services at Queen Mary’s.
Fellow councillor John Wilkinson said proposals to make Bexley Care Trust pay towards the cost of putting APOH changes into place was “kicking us while we are down”.
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