NHS spends £40m on fees to private agencies for doctors

Hospitals spent £137m on agency doctors in the last financial year because of a shortage of qualified workers in the National Health Service.

With commission at about 30 per cent, the reliance of the NHS on locum doctors has earned the private agencies an estimated £40m.

Department of Health figures showed that total spending on stand-in hospital doctors was £86m in 1997-98, £92m in 1998-9, £105m in 1999-2000 and £137m in 2001-02.

Sixteen NHS trusts spent more than £1m each on agency doctors, with high spenders including Barts and the London Trust (£1.96m), Frimley Park Trust, Surrey (£1.6m) and the Huddersfield Trust, West Yorkshire (£1.43m).

Sandra Gidley, the Liberal Democrat health spokeswoman, who obtained the figures, said that they proved the Government was not getting to the heart of recruitment problems in the NHS.

She said: "It's shocking that £40m of taxpayers' money is going into the pockets of fat-cat agency bosses.

"If ministers got to grips with the problems caused by early retirement and the lack of incentives for doctors, there would be no need to waste money on agency fees.

"The Government should allow more doctors to train to be consultants and should not be plugging private initiatives at taxpayers' expense."

A spokeswoman for the British Medical Association said: "This is indicative of the shortage of hospital consultants. We may well see an increase in locum spending for some time. There is no magic solution." It is calling for 650 refugee doctors to be allowed to take medical examinations more quickly to plug the gap.

The Government has committed itself to increasing the number of hospital consultants from its current total of 26,350 to almost 29,000 by 2004.

A Department of Health spokeswoman said: "We are committed to increasing capacity, and this means recruiting more NHS staff. It takes seven years to train a doctor and locums play an important and valuable role in the NHS, enabling short-term flexible needs to be met in the service."

She added: "There are more hospital doctors and consultants in the NHS than ever before, with a record 4,700 now in training."