Health workers in the Bristol region face job cuts due to high inflation and temporary Covid funding coming to an end. A local NHS boss has warned many staff members in fixed term posts will likely not have their contracts renewed, due to a real-terms cut in government funding.
During the pandemic the government provided extra funding to NHS organisations in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire, which partly went to paying the salaries of staff on fixed term contracts. This funding will cease next month.
As well as the loss of Covid funding, high inflation means the NHS must pay increased prices for goods and services, shrinking the amount the health service can actually get for its money. Health bosses are now consulting affected workers about a staffing restructure.
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Updates on the staff restructure were given to the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire Integrated Care Board (ICB) meeting on Thursday, February 2. Shane Devlin, chief executive of the ICB, said compulsory redundancies could be avoided.
He said: “A lot of people are not affected by the structural change and a lot of people will remain in the same job. However, we do have a number of people who are affected by the change. They are all individually aware of that change. After March 8, we will then hopefully be able to start making these changes.
“Because part of our change has meant a considerable reduction in fixed term posts, and also because we have held a large number of vacancies, we have not gone out with a voluntary redundancies process. There will still be people affected, but we are hoping to avoid any form of compulsory redundancies.”
It’s unclear how many roles will be affected and in which departments. This will depend on consultations with staff, and details should become clearer next month. Last month, Mr Devlin warned in a message to staff that the ICB will soon “feel a little smaller”.
He said: “I do not expect our organisation's staffing numbers to grow. There has been a reduction in our real-terms funding — this is due to the pay award and inflationary costs, which we now know are not going to be covered centrally. This means we need to find the money to cover this.
“The increase in funding that we have received over the past two years because of Covid is ceasing at the end of March. This means it is unlikely we are going to be able to renew fixed term contracts that have been funded by this money. Our ICB will soon start to feel a little smaller due to the reduction of fixed term posts.”
