Hospitals to be named and shamed in NHS league tables, Wes Streeting to pledge

NHS England will carry out a “no holds barred” review of NHS performance across England with the results made public in league tables which are regularly updated.

NHS trusts can expect to be ranked on a range of indicators such as finances, delivery of services, patient access to care and the competency of leadership.

Labour has already pledged to send “crack teams” of leading clinicians into four hospitals across Yorkshire and the Humber as part of a Government bid to cut down waiting lists and boost employment.

Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust, Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and Sheffield and Doncaster Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trusts are set to benefit from the specialists.

NHS leaders hit back at the proposed league tables, saying it could demoralise staff and accused ministers of “falling for the appealing notion of a magic productivity tree which will make the NHS more efficient just by shaking the magic tree harder.”

Under the Government plans, persistently failing managers will be replaced and turnaround teams sent into trusts that are running big financial deficits or offering patients a poor service.

Meanwhile, the best NHS performers will be given greater spending control to help modernise their buildings, equipment and technology.

The Department of Health said there is currently little incentive for trusts to run budget surpluses as NHS trusts are unable to benefit from them, but that will now change, with top-performing trusts given more of this cash.

Mr Streeting said: “The Budget showed this Government prioritises the NHS, providing the investment needed to rebuild the health service.

“Today we are announcing the reforms to make sure every penny of extra investment is well spent and cuts waiting times for patients.

“There’ll be no more turning a blind eye to failure. We will drive the health service to improve, so patients get more out of it for what taxpayers put in.

“Our health service must attract top talent, be far more transparent to the public who pay for it, and run as efficiently as global businesses.

“With the combination of investment and reform, we will turn the NHS around and cut waiting times from 18 months to 18 weeks.”

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said “the prospect of more ‘league tables’ will concern health leaders, as these can strip out important underlying information.

“NHS staff are doing their very best for patients under very challenging circumstances and we do not want them feeling like they are being named and shamed.

“League tables in themselves do not lead to improvement. Trusts struggling with consistent performance issues, some of which reflect contextual issues such as underlying population health and staff shortages, need to be identified and supported in order to recover.”