Situation 'unsustainable' as Wirral NHS services face cuts over £36m budget black hole

Funding for some NHS services have struggled to keep up with demand
-Credit: (Image: PA)


NHS funded services in Wirral face cuts in order to combat an expected black hole of £36m in the NHS Cheshire and Merseyside’s budget for the area. A new report said increases in care costs were unsustainable as spending nearly doubles in five years.

Reports published ahead of a Wirral Place Based Partnership Board meeting on November 21 show Wirral health services have already gone over budget by £28.6m so far this year, £12.7m more than planned. The board is made up of organisations like Wirral Council and local NHS trusts to oversee services meeting health care needs in a particular area.

While NHS partners are expected to be in line with a planned overspend of £19.4m by the end of the year, the report said there are still significant risks even with “stringent mitigation and action plans.” Increased activity and cost in adult social care which is overseen by Wirral Council is also expected to lead to a £6.5m overspend.

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The £28.6m budget black hole includes a £12.4m overspend by Wirral University Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, £6.6m more than expected. Wirral Place, part of the NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Care Board (ICB), has gone over budget by £16.4m which was £6.1m more than expected.

Current predictions are that ICB services in Wirral are expected to go over budget by £36m at the end of this financial year which is £15.3m more than planned and the ICB has looked at ways of cutting services locally, including its support for one cancer centre which will see their overall funding drop by a third.

The ICB was given £150m of support funding by NHS England to try and close its budget gap with a target improvement of 5% which has led to some budgets being reduced. A different financial report before the board said the local NHS faced a “continuing challenge to support prevention and other services in the context of ongoing demand for both elective and urgent care services.”

The NHS is spending more money than expected on a number of different services including £3m on health care for people with long-term complex health needs and £1.7m more on mental health care packages. Another key overspend is in prescriptions of nearly £2m so far this year.

Despite the overspend, the ICB report said they’re on track to deliver 79% of plans to cut spending. Wirral ICB services are funded the equivalent of £2,308 per person, nearly £200 more than other areas across the ICB.

However the report also shows budgets have failed to keep up with spending going back to 2019 with the budget for care for people of all ages nearly doubling from £54m in 2019 to £106m this year. A £29m increase from 2021 to 2023 was driven by increased demand and rising costs.

The ICB said the current increase in spending was “unsustainable” as costs rose by 15.2% over 2022 and 2023 but funding for the NHS only increased by 9.2% over the same period. Care needs of patients in nursing homes has also increased adding an increase of £8m as 40 more people need high levels of care.