Plans to axe hundreds of health service jobs have been paused amid uncertainty over how redundancy costs will be covered.
Staff at the West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board (ICB) face an uncertain future after millions of pounds of cost-savings were required.
Staffing at the ICB, which plans and delivers health services in the county, would reduce from the equivalent of around 1,060 full-time roles to 650.
The government launched a ten-year plan which includes cutting ICB running costs by 50 per cent. The health service administrative body NHS England will also be abolished.
An ICB report said a consultation on the West Yorkshire changes should have started in July.
But the ICB board insisted on first knowing that funding for the redundancy payments, estimated at up to £1bn nationally, would be made available.
The report said: “Clearly the ICB cannot proceed to offer redundancy without understanding how it will be paid for.”
Further details on how the restructuring would work and the impact on staff were also needed by the West Yorkshire ICB and others around England.
The report, by ICB accountable officer Tim Ryley, said: “The ICB in West Yorkshire have, along with some others, therefore paused the launch of a consultation and the implementation indefinitely.”
Mr Ryley’s report, presented to Leeds City Council’s adults and health scrutiny board, said the changes would take a minimum of eight months after a consultation was launched.
The Department of Health and Social Care said it was fixing the “broken” health system it inherited from the last government with an extra £26bn.
A spokesperson said: “But extra money alone is not enough and that’s why we are tackling inefficiencies and driving up productivity in the NHS.
“We have underlined the need for trusts and ICB’s to cut bureaucracy and duplication to invest even further in the frontline, so we can support hard-working staff and deliver a better service for patients and better value for taxpayers’ money.”
Scrapping NHS England means it is effectively merged with the Department and thousands of jobs will be cut at both organisations.
An NHS England spokesperson said: “ICBs have worked flat out to identify savings that can be reinvested back into patient care, and a number of them have well-developed plans in place for redundancies which we are supporting them with.”
