Doctor paid £2,000 for one day of work at trust
The scandal-hit Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust paid a doctor more than £2,000 for one day's work, new figures have revealed.
The payment – to a consultant surgeon for a locum shift – was one of several across the country paid out during 2012 which have been labelled as "shockingly wasteful".
In three years hospitals have spent more than £2billion on locum doctors, with NHS spending on locums rocketing by eight per cent since 2011.
The payments were criticised by Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients' Association, who said: "This is a shockingly wasteful way to run a service.
"So many hospitals are paying vast sums because there is no proper planning and management, so that instead locums are brought in on a last-minute, ad-hoc basis, at huge expense and to the detriment of patient care."
Other payments included North Cumbria University Hospitals' Trust spending £15,000 to hire a consultant cardiologist for a week last July.
Meanwhile a trainee doctor at Princess Alexandra Hospital in Essex was paid £2,107 for a 12-and-a-half hour shift.
Health minister Dr Dan Poulter linked the figures to the previous Government's decision to join the European Working Time Directive. It set a maximum working week for doctors at 48 hours in 2009.
Dr Poulter said: "It was a disastrous decision." He added that the best-performing NHS trusts did not rely heavily on locums and that the excess spending was "a sign of poor management".
