It’s really quite surprising that anyone is getting frothed up about 31,000 roles lost in the NHS on four counts:
1.It’s less than 2% of the workforce – hardly a massive cut compared to the 10-20% in year cuts that many organisations (public and private) have suffered in the last 4 years.
2. The cuts represent less than 6% of the NHS jobs added between 2002 and 2009.
3. As has already been pointed out, the NHS workforce continues to grow in some areas. The cycle of roles being removed can be found in each of the last 12 years – last year the losses were mainly in management, less managers being precisely the thing that clinicians say is required.
4. Against a backdrop of 8 consecutive years of 2-3% annual productivity declines in the NHS when the number of posts was rapidly increased it should be possible to take out many more roles just to restore the balance with where the NHS should be on productivity measures (see McKinsey report published in 2009 that details the potential improvements in great detail:
McKinsey’s 2009 report