HSJ Health Check

This week we discuss why a £300,000 exit payment to a former ICB CEO has proved so controversial, and how NHS England has tried to justify the move.
We also look at what the row reveals about the wider pressure ICBs are under, as they face deep cuts and continued uncertainty over their future role.
This includes the questionable use of public money in wider ICB restructures, which are in many cases forced to pay for redundancies they may one day regret.
And with devolution to mayoral strategic authorities, how do ICBs and ‘places’ fit into the new world?

Now the dust has settled on two major maternity reviews, HSJ Health Check is joined by Dr Bill Kirkup to discuss what happens next.

Dr Kirkup has been investigating maternity scandals for over a decade, including Morecambe Bay and East Kent. 

We discuss how the sector has responded to the tranche of recommendations, whether a public inquiry is needed, and how leaders should respond when things go wrong in their organisations. He also touched on more contentious issues, warning that the current clinical negligence system is set up to be “adversarial”, and how the NHS needs to avoid “othering” maternity services.

Many breathed a sigh of relief when the resident doctors accepted the latest government pay offer, putting an end to years of strikes. However, just a week later, consultants voted for industrial action.
We discuss the demands of the British Medical Association’s consultants committee and how the government could avert another set of damaging strike action.
We also talk more about the first complaints made about clinicians’ use of AI, as revealed in HSJ this week, and how the national AI regulation review could change how it is used in the NHS.

This week Dave West and Henry Anderson are joined by health economist Anita Charlesworth, who is co-chairing a commission into NHS productivity for the Health Foundation.
We discuss the workforce “boom and bust”, why the covid-19 pandemic cost the NHS £20bn in lost care and how the health service can recover at a time when public spending is under pressure.

NHS maternity services are again in the spotlight after an independent review revealed serious, systemic failings at Nottingham University Hospitals.

The report by Donna Ockenden criticised NHS executives for refusing to speak to the review - leading the government to threaten prison time for staff who do not cooperate. Will this make a difference for future investigations? And, amid growing calls for a public inquiry into the state of maternity care across the country, we ask what this would mean for the NHS. 

With Henry Anderson and Emily Townsend.

Send thoughts and ideas to annabelle.collins@hsj.co.uk