Wolverhampton health bosses fall £8m short of savings target

Finance chiefs at New Cross Hospital had planned to save £28m in 2014/15. But they only managed to save £20m, just shy of three quarters of the total.

Bosses labelled the shortfall as a 'major' financial risk in a report to board members.

This time last year, the trust that runs New Cross fell £13m short of a £26m savings target, so money was carried over to the 2014/15 financial year.

Next year's savings target is not yet known. It comes as bosses shell out £38m on a new emergency centre, which includes a badly-needed new A&E unit.

The unit is three times the size of the current one and comes as extra patients flood the hospital from Staffordshire in the wake of the dissolution of Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust.

The £28m savings are part of a government plan to save billions in the NHS. At New Cross, cash has been saved from a variety of sources, including staffing reviews, reducing how long patients stay in the hospital and reducing administration costs.

Hospital chief executive David Loughton recently revealed the trust would deliberately go into debt to avoid having to sack staff. The NHS faces a desperate time, with 75 per cent of acute trusts forecasting a year end deficit over the next year.