Five hospices caring for terminally ill people have planned job cuts in the past two months due to financial pressures, BBC News has learned. St Giles Hospice, which runs community services and in-patient sites in the West Midlands, has started consulting staff this week on a reduction of 40 posts, including clinical roles, which could involve redundancies. The organisation representing the sector, Hospice UK, has warned of a funding crisis and further cuts in services.
It says government must provide urgent cash investment. The Department of Health and Social Care acknowledged there were challenges that would "take time to fix". A combination of factors, including energy bills, higher wage costs and limited NHS funding, is being blamed.
St Giles has an annual budget of £10m, with 350 staff, more than three-quarters of whom are in clinical positions. Five years ago, NHS funding covered about 25% of costs - but this has fallen to 17.7%.
The management says contracts with local health boards have often been below inflation, so the NHS share of the overall budget has dropped. St Giles is expecting a deficit of £1.6m this financial year.
Previous annual shortfalls have been covered by drawing from reserves but the management has decided reductions in services are now required to stabilise the finances. As well as the 40 job losses, the consultation with staff warns the number of beds across the hospices two sites will be cut from 23 to 15, meaning fewer patients will receive ca.