The legacy of PFI in the NHS
South London Healthcare NHS Trust includes Queen Mary Hospital in Sidcup, Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich and Princess Royal Hospital in Bromley. Its budget shortfall (£1 million a week) is the equivalent of employing 1,200 nurses or doing 200 hip operations a week. It is the first NHS organisation to go into the "unsustainable providers regime" — a system set up by New Labour but never used. Under that regime an administrator is brought in to run the Trust's board and to recommend measures directly to the Health Secretary about how to put the Trust on a more sustainable footing. The...