Hands up all those who think the Government can save £0.55bn in sickness absence costs?
If you put your hand up please put it down again as it is a physical impossibility, and the reason it is impossible is that the Government, like
many employers, does not understand the difference between the two words costs and savings.
Let us assume an average days cost in the NHS is £80.00, many of those on low pay will be the ones more prone to absence and so the actual cost might be too high but is unlikely to be too low.
Therefore divide £0,55b by £80.00 = 6.875m days. Assuming a normal working week and 4 weeks holiday there are 228 days available for work;
therefore by dividing 6.875m days by 228 we see that there will be 30,150 employees surplus to requirements.
However I understand that the NHS spends “a fortune on temps” and another fortune on outsourced employees. I don’t know what a fortune
in NHS terms looks like but I assume it is not £0.55bn.
If we are generous and assume £0.25bn is spent on temps and outsourcing that means we need to eliminate 16,447 jobs (slightly less than
half the original number). Now I don’t believe either Government or unions are likely to get rid of that number of jobs, which is why I say the wasted costs are probably true but achieving the same amount of savings are cloud cuckoo land!
Ah you say we recycle money these days, however, whether the money is spent on more patient care, or recycled, the fact is the NHS physically can not save £0.55bn without reducing head count.
Hands up all those who believe that will happen?
Dudley Lusted
Head of Corporate Healthcare
Development, Axa PPP healthcare
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