Hospital bosses warn Government to raise NHS spending or watch the health service crumble
Chris Hopson said NHS is 'under the greatest pressure in a generation' in plea for further cash
HOSPITAL bosses have warned the government to raise NHS spending or watch the health service crumble.
Ahead of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement NHS Providers chief executive Chris Hopson said it is “under the greatest pressure in a generation” in a plea for further cash.
He also warned Jeremy Hunt’s vision for a seven-day NHS is “impossible” to deliver with the current level of funding and staffing.
In a stark assessment of the financial difficulties facing the system Mr Hopson said the service was already over-stretched and “something has to give”.
Writing in The Observer, he warned that senior hospital trust managers face a “stark choice” between investing the money needed or “watching the NHS slowly deteriorate”.
Mr Hopson said: “Jeremy Hunt and others have made a very strong case for seven-day services but it seems to us it is impossible to deliver it on the current level of staff and the current money available.
“If something has to give at the moment, and we are trying to do what we are currently doing, it can’t cover important new policies like seven-day services.”
Speaking on Sunday Mr Hopson said health bodies were already being forced to cut services due to a shortage of funds.
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“We have already seen, over the last three or four months, the beginnings of these kind of choices that need to be made,” he said.
“We had a CCG up in the North West that said it needed to postpone all non-urgent operations for four months.”
He told BBC’s Andrew Marr Show: “We have now got hospital trusts having to close services, we have also got trusts who are saying that the only way to make the money add up is to cut the workforce.
“These are all things that have been done by other public service, but it’s very different for the NHS.”
He added: “They cannot provide the right quality of care and meet the performance standards on the money that is available and something has to give.
“We should have a proper debate about what should give, rather than pretending the gap doesn’t exist or leaving it up to each individual area to make a decision about what should give.”
But Home Secretary Amber Rudd hit back on Sunday saying “I’m not sure anything has gone wrong on the scale he has put forward” adding: “Most people anecdotally tell me things are good.”