New report says cash-strapped NHS trusts could be forced to axe thousands of jobs

Redundancies, recruitment freezes and potentially more privatisation is on the agenda (Photo: Rawpixel)

Thousands of health workers in England could lose their jobs as scores of NHS trusts sink under a combined deficit of more than three-quarters of a billion pounds.

That’s the shocking implication in a new report published this week by health service experts at The King’s Fund thinktank.

The report says a lack of cash is forcing health leaders to make “increasingly difficult choices” that are impacting patients and could result in more job cuts.

Bosses have already announced that up to 30,000 jobs could be axed as a result of health secretary Wes Streeting’s NHS “reset”.

Some 37 percent of Trust’s planned to cut clinical posts, while 86 percent planned to cut equally vital non-clinical roles.

Hospitals dealing with acute illnesses—such as broken limbs and urgent surgical care, for example—account for three-quarters of NHS spending and 69 percent of the deficit.  

The King’s Fund’s Danielle Jefferies, said, “Greater reductions in the numbers of frontline staff or further reprioritisation of investment in services could become more commonplace as these organisations try to cope, all of which will worry patients as they fear a decline in the quality of care”.

Put simply, the current spending envelope does not match the government’s ambitions, and the Spring Statement did not change this reality.

The impact is already being felt in cities such as Stoke-on-Trent, in the Midlands.

Hospital bosses there are planning to slash spending by over £60 million next year, many of which will come from “workforce controls”. 

That means redundancies, recruitment freezes and potentially more privatisation is on the agenda at a time when hospitals are in a desperate battle to stop experienced clinicians leaving.

NHS England admits it is already short of 12,000 physiotherapists, 29,000 qualified nurses, 12,000 hospital doctors. The health service had more than 106,000 unfilled full time posts in 2025.

Every missing clinician means a longer wait for those in pain or in desperate need of treatment—and it puts massive pressure on the staff that remain.

The growing NHS financial crisis is yet another Tory legacy that Labour has failed to deal with. And as the system continues to crumble, the anger and disillusionment of both patients and staff can only spread.