Government support needed to tackle £18m health overspend

Obi Hasan, the financial lead for the change team at Jersey’s Health and Community Services, said it would need government support to plug the deficit

Jersey’s health department has predicted it will be £18m over budget by December 2024.

Obi Hasan, the financial lead for the change team at Jersey’s Health and Community Services, said it would need government support to plug the deficit.

Mr Hasan blamed slow recruitment processes for putting a strain on the budget.

Health Minister Deputy Tom Binet said he would ask the States Assembly for more money to help the health service.

'Severe consequences'

Mr Hasan said: “Having the right processes in place will allow us to attract people on island to replace agency staff which costs us twice the amount of money for providing the same quality of care as our permanent staff would do.”

He said health would need £18m from the government, but the overspend could increase.

“It could end up being more but we are doing everything we can to mitigate those pressures,” Mr Hasan said.

He added the health department has delivered more savings than planned in the first three months of the year.

Health Minister Deputy Tom Binet said he had committed to asking the States assembly for more money.

“If they [health] don’t meet the £18m target it means there are going to be some pretty severe consequences for the quality of our health service and I don’t think that’s right, I don’t think the island will want that anyway,” he said.

Deputy Binet added in previous years “we have tried to introduce more and more things without the right budgetary controls which has meant deficits at the end of each year”.

He said this was something he would reassess to “make sure we have the right budgets each year going forward”.