Wrong and misguided

Struggling families in Nottinghamshire will suffer the most from plans to axe up to 60 health visitors in the area because of the government’s pressure on the NHS to make savings.

Garry Guye, Unite lead officer for health in the East Midlands told UNITElive this is a very serious development in Nottinghamshire.

“The grievous cuts planned for the health visitor workforce will mean that the 20 ‘lead clinics’ will end, which will have a disastrous impact, particularly in already deprived areas of the county,” he said.

Unite and the Community Practitioners’ and Health Visitors’ Association (CPHVA), condemned plans to cut 38 whole time equivalent (WTE) health visitor posts from a workforce of about 138 by Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust.

“The main reason for these cuts is directly linked to the government’s austerity drive to achieve £20bn in so-called ‘efficiency savings’ from the NHS,” said Guye.

Because many health visitors work part-time, the 38 WTE jobs could translate into a loss of up to 60 health visitors. The health visitors should know their future from January 9, when one-to-one interviews with line managers are expected.

Squeeze

This is compounded by the squeeze on the public health budget controlled by Nottinghamshire County Council. The contract carried out by the trust on the council’s behalf is set to decline from £15.4m this year to just over £13.6m in the financial year 2018/19.

“Unite is strongly opposed to the proposed reduction in health visitor numbers and we are in the process of preparing counter proposals,” said Guye.

“We are calling for an urgent meeting with the trust management when we hope to raise genuine concerns about the wider professional issues,” he added.

According to the trust’s website, it is a major provider of mental health, intellectual disability and community healthcare services for the people of Nottinghamshire.

“Vital child protection and safeguarding services will also be under threat as there will be fewer health visitors employed,” said Guye.

“The trust is wrong and misguided if it believes that this work can be delegated to less qualified staff who are not registered by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) which is a key professional benchmark,” he added.

It sees about 190,000 people every year and employs 9,000 staff.