In her first speech to the Commons as Chancellor, Rachel Reeves committed to “reining in” consultancy spending in government departments.
Both Labour and Tory campaigns in the general election promised to reduce the public sector’s dependence on external firms, which failed so massively, so expensively and so publicly to deliver functioning test and trace systems as the Covid pandemic took hold.
But Ms Reeves’ speech came a week after NHS England – which has time and again been told since the election to batten down the hatches as the NHS is plunged into yet another winter crisis with no extra funding – signed yet another 4-year £40m contract for management consultants to give “commercial advice”.
A fortnight before Ms Reeves’ speech NHS England had also required nine of the 42 Integrated Care Boards (Black Country, Cheshire & Merseyside, Greater Manchester, Lancashire & South Cumbria, Mid & South Essex, Nottingham & Nottinghamshire, Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin, South East London and South Yorkshire), the ones seen as facing the biggest financial problems for 2024/25, to bring in management consultants to find ways to make immediate cuts in spending, in the hope of preventing the combined deficits exceeding the £2.2 billion that NHSE has already agreed to cover.
Full article in The Lowdown, 7 September 2024