Hospital staff cuts to pay bill

Staff numbers at Walsall Manor Hospital will be cut and patients encouraged to leave quickly to ensure the trust meets the yearly £12 million mortgage payments on its new buildings, it emerged today.

Private company Skanska is carrying out the £170 million rebuild and the hospital will be expected to pay the cash back to the firm over a period of 34 years.

Failure to meet the repayments could place the hospital at risk of being taken over by another trust.

In order to meet the payments the trust has put forward a number of suggestions aimed at ensuring it is in a strong financial position by the time the new buildings are handed over in 2010.

They include cutting the workforce over the next three to five years to reduce staff costs, reducing patients' length of stay in hospital so beds can be closed if they are not needed and identifying and eliminating wasteful practices which cost the trust time and money.

Bosses have refused to reveal whether there will be compulsory redundancies but have stressed any year on year cost cutting is normally achieved through staff leaving and not being replaced.

Director of development Sarah Smith said: "We need to become as efficient as we possibly can by reducing time people on average spend in a hospital bed, preventing duplication of effort and unnecessary activities and as we do year on year reduce our costs. In terms of staff this is generally achieved through natural wastage. However going forward we are much more knowledgeable about staff levels and skills required to run the hospital and we will be working towards these staffing levels over the next three to five years."

The revamp will include an almost total rebuild of the hospital. There will be a new reception with shops, a cafe and seating. The main entrance will be moved from Moat Road to Pleck Road.

By Emma Tate