The NHS will be allowed to overspend this year to pay for planned staff redundancies, so as to halve the overall head counts of integrated care boards (ICBs) and abolish NHS England.
Health and social care secretary Wes Streeting said the plan to slash “unnecessary bureaucracy” will raise £1bn a year by the end of this parliament, with the money being put back into patient care. However, the NHS won’t see that extra money immediately, as redundancy payouts will cost an estimated £1bn and will be paid out over the next couple of years.1
NHS leaders in England had been negotiating with the Treasury for a national staff redundancy fund to pay for the job cuts.2The BMJ understands that the Treasury blocked extra money but that a compromise has been reached that means the NHS will be allowed to overspend this year. The overspend, which will be …
