£30m boost to tackle waiting lists
Money from the DUP's Confidence and Supply deal with the Conservative government is being released to help bring down hospital waiting times.
Last updated 23rd Mar 2018
A major new investment to tackle hospital waiting lists has been announced by the Department of Health.
The initiative will involve using £30m of the £100m health and social care transformation funding made available for 2018/19.
The money will be targeted at inpatient and outpatient waiting times, with priority given to the most urgent cases and reducing the longest waits.
The biggest change will see the establishment of elective care centres. They are stand-alone day surgery units that can deal with non-complex routine operations and assessments.
The £30m will also be spent on the development of enhanced primary care services in GP clinics and initiatives around staff training, social care and countering diabetes.
Richard Pengelly, Department of Health permanent secretary, said: “The long term answer to waiting times and other major challenges remains transformation of the health and social care system. However, recognising that the transformation vision represents a 10-year agenda, we must also acknowledge that immediate action is needed on our unacceptable waiting times.
“The current waiting times are a consequence of rising demand for services set against an outdated HSC system that is no longer able to meet this demand. Transformation means organising our services more effectively - delivering more in primary care settings and reforming hospital services.”
Mr Pengelly added: “To deliver transformation, we also need to increase public trust in the system and relieve some of the pressure on our staff.
"Today’s announcement is an important step towards that goal. Further investment will be required in subsequent years to prevent any progress made being lost.”
MLAs at a Department of Health briefing on Thursday were also told of a challenging overall financial situation facing health and social care provision in the coming year.
The recently announced health budget allocation represents a 2.6% increase for 2018/19, compared to its full budget for 2017/18.
But there's still a projected shortfall in the spending required to maintain existing services, so further allocations will be required through the next year.
Ulster Unionist Health Spokesperson, Roy Beggs, has welcomed the announcement of additional money but has warned that using resources intended to transform the service is simply kicking the can further down the road.
The MLA said: “The problems in our Health Service are totally unprecedented. Never before in the NHS’s 70 year history have so many local people been waiting, and for such appalling lengths of time.
“Whilst I welcome the announcement of this funding - and it will certainly come as longed-for relief for the patients that it will help - the reality is by diverting money away from transforming the service, the Health Department is simply delaying tackling the root cause of the waiting list crisis.
"I hope that the Department will now be maximising the use of NHS resources to enable more patients to be treated in our hospitals and minimise the use of short term agencies to temporarily adjust list sizes."
And Sinn Féin spokesperson Pat Sheehan said:
“While I welcome any injection of money into waiting lists, let’s be clear this is not additional money for our hard-pressed health services as these funds are simply being moved from the transformation fund.
“The Health Service remains £160m short of what it needs just to stand still.
"Without enough money to stand still it is difficult to see how waiting lists will reduce or how Transformation can be delivered.
"The bottom line is that by propping up a Tory government still wedded to austerity the DUP has ensured the Health budget isn't keeping up with rising demand."