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Hospital chiefs warned of 'flawed' staffing two years ago, claim
MANAGEMENT of a department at a South Yorkshire hospital which is running at a £2.2 million deficit was warned two years ago that a workforce strategy they were implementing was "flawed", a leading union rep has claimed.
Joan Keene, GMB officer for members in the NHS in Yorkshire, said she was alarmed but not surprised to learn of the overspend in the theatres and surgical department of Barnsley Hospital.
Three managers from the department have now been placed on gardening leave, while an external team has been brought in to "stabilise the situation" before starting work to improve the unit's performance.
Unions have blamed the growing deficit on the use of agency staff and locums to cover staff shortages.
Ms Keene said GMB had warned the management about this two years ago when they introduced a new workforce strategy.
She said: "We learn with alarm, but with no surprise, of the 2million overspend on the theatres and surgical department.
"It gives me no pleasure to say we warned management this would happen. Management were told quite clearly over two years ago that the workforce strategy they were then introducing was flawed, would cause disruption to services, and would bring instability and job insecurity.
"Staff are not able to deliver a service of excellence to the public when management put in place a flawed strategy that reduces staffing levels to the bare minimum."
Ms Keene also questioned the cost implications of managers being put on gardening leave.
A spokesman for Barnsley Hospital said: "A review of the performance of the surgical division, which isforecast to produce asignificant deficit in the current financial year, has led to the board decidinga different set of management skill sets are required to prevent the deficitworsening and alsohaving a long-termadverse affect on the rest of the organisation.
"In terms of thethreesenior hospital staff managers directly affected, the trust recognises this is a difficult situation andtalks are on-going with them to reach an amiable resolution over identifying appropriate alternative roles within the organisation.
"We can assure patients and their relativesthere will be no effect on the first class services and care they receive, whichare always our top priority."
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Saturday 04 February 2012
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