Anger at £50m staff payouts in NHS shake-up

Final figures reveal 250 staff in 2012-13 received £15.5m in pay-outs from 14 primary care trusts (PCTs) and the regional strategic health authority which were abolished on April 1.

The deals come on top of pay-outs worth £13.1m for 270 staff in 2011-12 and £26.1m for 660 staff in the previous year.

The biggest pay-off in the region is believed to total more than £410,000. Ten executives received deals worth more than £200,000.

It has also emerged that a husband-and-wife team called in as temporary consultants to hospitals in Leeds in June together received a pay-out worth nearly £1m when they left their posts at two PCTs in the North East two months earlier.

Karen Straughair was paid more than £605,000 when NHS South of Tyne and Wear was wound up, while her husband Chris Reed, chief executive of NHS North of Tyne, received more than £345,000.

Their placements in Leeds, which have now ceased after permanent appointments were made, are believed to be among dozens of cases involving former NHS managers who have been re-employed by the health service despite receiving pay-offs.

Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham said: “This is precisely what we warned would happen when we and millions of others pleaded with David Cameron to stop his re-organisation. But the sheer scale of the waste is breathtaking.

“David Cameron’s refusal to listen and honour his promise of ‘no top-down’ re-organisation has resulted in a scandalous abuse of precious NHS resources. He has given gold-plated, six-figure pay-offs to thousands of managers while handing P45s to 6,000 nurses.

“Why on earth weren’t staff who were to be retained by the NHS simply transferred to the new organisations instead of given huge pay-offs?”

Marisa Howes, of Managers in Partnership which represents NHS managers, said it could not comment on individual awards made under nationally-agreed terms.

But she added: “We have argued from the start that the reorganisation and turmoil it caused was absolutely unnecessary and wasteful both financially and in terms of the loss of skilled staff.”

A Department of Health spokeswoman said there were nearly 8,000 fewer managers and 4,000 more clinicians working in the NHS since 2010.

She said: “The Health Secretary has been clear that very senior managers’ pay in the NHS needs more restraint. We have set out proposals to cap redundancy pay-outs for senior managers and claw back all or part of the payment if they return to work for the NHS within a year of being made redundant. Taxpayers want to reduce bureaucracy and increase frontline care staff. That is what we will continue to deliver.”

In Yorkshire, the regional health authority paid out the largest amount with 36 staff receiving £3.65m in 2012-13 – an average award of £100,000. Three executives received more than £200,000.

A total of £1.76m was paid out in Bradford to 40 staff, while in North Yorkshire, which has faced long-running financial problems, 31 staff were handed a total of £1.75m.

Pay-outs were worth £1.69m in Leeds, £1.3m in Wakefield, £1.2m in the East Riding, and £1.12m in Sheffield.

In another deal, Sir Neil McKay, former boss of hospitals in Leeds, and chairman of the controversial review of children’s heart surgery which recommended axing services in Leeds, received £420,000 when he left his last job as chief executive of the strategic health authority covering East Anglia and the Midlands. He has since been made chairman of the Greater Manchester Cancer Services Provider Board, where he has chosen not to receive a salary.