Report raises concerns about NHS spending on agency midwives

NHS spending on agency midwives has more than doubled since 2013, according to a report from the Royal College of Midwives.

The organisation's estimates indicate that the NHS in England spent 25 million pounds on agency midwives in 2015, which was a 40 percent rise compared to 2014 and a 146 percent jump over four years.

Of the 123 NHS trusts in England with maternity units that responded to a Freedom of Information request, 46 had used agency midwives last year to fill gaps on hospital rotas. Total spending in 2015 on agency midwives, overtime and the NHS' flexible "bank" midwives came to 72.7 million pounds.

This is despite the fact that the government introduced a cap on NHS trusts' spending on agency staff in 2015, with the figures showing that costs continue to rise for many NHS organisations.

Jon Skewes from the Royal College of Midwives said: "An over-reliance on temporary staff is clearly more expensive than employing the correct number of permanent staff and needs to be corrected sooner rather than later."

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