NHS non-medical hiring spree is questioned by MP John Redwood

FORMER Tory cabinet minister John Redwood has questioned why the NHS has recruited such a large number of non-medical and managerial staff in recent years.

He said questions need to be asked about whether or not the spending has contributed towards driving down waiting times.

Mr Redwood spoke to GB News after uncovering data which showed that non-medical NHS staff in recent years has increased from 1,002,347 to 1,117,685 currently.

He told GB News: “We have provided tens of billions of extra money over the last three years, some of it was very necessary for the extraordinary expenditures in handling Covid, but some of it went into general purposes.

“I’ve discovered that, up to the end of the third quarter of last year, they expanded the non-medical workforce by 115,000 people.

“And within that, the number of managers went up by another 3,500, so they have over 36,000 managers now. So, I am just asking – ‘what are they all doing?’

“Can they really support medical staff sufficiently so that we can get those waiting lists down? Would it mean that more people get a GP appointment? Would it mean that more people get through A&E quickly?”

In a discussion during Friday Morning with Esther McVey and Philip Davies, he said: “I trust the managers, and I would like to hear more from the senior managers of the NHS.

“It seems to me that the senior managers responsible for well over a million people need to have strong views on the right terms and conditions for what the people are doing.

“Are the jobs satisfying, are they feasible jobs where staff morale can be high? And are they properly rewarded?”

He added: “Very clearly, despite all this recruitment, we’ve still got lots of vacancies.

“The NHS is still spending a small fortune on agency staff when it would be a lot cheaper and better to have people who were full-time employees who were on normal pay, rather than these extravagant high fees people are paid to get them in in an emergency.”