Posted on 1 June 2010

Leeds hospitals budget slashed

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Bosses at Leeds hospitals will see their spending budget cut by £18 million this year with further cuts on the way.

It must be hoped that the ill and the injured along with those who require medical help do not suffer additional traumer due to the cutbacks.

The move, which will see the budget go down from £57 million to £39 million, sees projects for new equipment and buildings put at risk and follows an announcement that by the end of 2012 the annual capital allowance will be only £24 million, a figure that is likely to remain in force until 2014.

The Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust board already has a backlog of building works and a new £1.4 million unit for kidney patients has been cancelled as the trust now can’t afford it. About £21 million of this year’s £39 million budget has already been allocated to a reorganisation of services which sees children’s beds concentrated at Leeds General Infirmary and adults centred on St James’s Hospital. Much of the remainder will go towards new IT projects and some new medical equipment.

Neil Chapman, finance director at the NHS trust has drawn up a five-year plan aimed at making efficiency savings while improving front-line services. He said: “Should an essential piece of medical equipment fail in a year or an area of infrastructure become unsafe unexpectedly, substitution will take place so that the problem will be remedied at the expense of a lesser priority.”