Dumfries and Galloway well being chiefs are dealing with a £20million funding shortfall.
And so they imagine it could be “stretching mathematical credibility” to steadiness the books over a brief interval.
Jeff Ace, the chief government of NHS Dumfries and Galloway (proper), this week admitted he's “undecided” it's at the moment potential to reassure the general public concerning the degree of service they’d obtain if the required cuts are made.
The well being board must slash £20m from its funds for 2022/23 to achieve a break-even place.
Finance director Katy Kerr warned board members on Monday she feared the one approach to do that was to ask the Scottish Authorities for further money.
She stated: “At this stage I can’t see any choice which doesn’t search further non-recurring help to bridge that in-year hole of £20million.”
A letter from the Scottish Authorities’s director of well being finance, Richard McCallum, to Mr Ace revealed that any monetary help provided shall be on the identical phrases as earlier than the coronavirus pandemic.
Meaning it can “have to be accompanied by a restoration plan and shall be repayable in full by the board” and returning to a monetary steadiness inside three years. Mr Ace advised the assembly: “I feel mathematically the return from an underlying place of a
£20-£30million deficit inside three years is very tough to think about – on high of discovering further financial savings to repay £20million.
“It’s stretching mathematical credibility. It’s not that there are an inventory of issues that may be actually tough to do, it’s that there isn't a such checklist we might reel off that may generate these kinds of financial savings.
“You're looking at very, very vital reductions in our baseline staffing, very, very vital reductions in our infrastructure and repair choices and even then you definately simply can’t make this add up inside our requirement to offer a protected and complete set of providers.”
Ms Kerr added they'd been “fairly open and clear” with the Scottish Authorities over the board’s monetary place, with most well being boards throughout the nation dealing with actual monetary challenges.
And she or he feared there was a protracted approach to go earlier than there was a “real looking acknowledgment of among the pressures”.
Chairman Nick Morris stated the one approach to ship recurring financial savings can be if we “rework the providers radically”.
He requested how a PR message might be put out to the general public “to provide assurance about how we are going to take care of this”.
However Mr Ace responded: “The dimensions of those monetary financial savings is such I’m undecided we are able to assure the general public will see a service providing on the finish of this they are going to be reassured by.
“I’m undecided what reassurance we may give in the mean time till we’ve acquired that checklist of proposals that may ship on the dimensions of this.”