NHS Scotland spent �28m on agency nurses last year

The figures from the Scottish Executive's Information and Statistics Division (ISD) show that more than �28.1m was spent on agency nurses in the 12 months to March 2003.

This was almost �3.6m more than the previous year and a �9.1m increase on 2000/1.

The statistics also showed that the total number of nurses and midwives employed by the NHS in Scotland increased by 2% in the last year, to more than 54,000.

The increase in NHS staff caused a drop in the overall use of agency nurses, but some specialist areas, such as intensive care, still depend on agencies because they are short of highly specialised workers.

Short-term basis

The bulk of the cost of agency nurses was in acute services, where �21.6m was spent.

Elsewhere, �2.6m was paid to nursing agencies for elderly care and �1.2m for NHS mental health services.

Health Minister Malcolm Chisholm said he recognised that there were circumstances where agency staff were required on a short-term basis.

However, he admitted he was concerned at the rising cost of specialist nurses.

Mr Chisholm said: "I have recently stressed that NHS employers should work to best practice set out in the Audit Scotland report on the use of bank and agency nurses."

"They must minimise the routine use of agency nurses as they have in NHS Tayside, for example, by making sure they have a larger proportion of nurses employed in permanent positions."

Using middlemen to employ nursing staff is costing over �28m, almost �4m more than last year, yet bizarrely, we are actually getting less for our money. Shona Robison SNP health spokeswoman

Nursing unions expressed "major concerns" over the figures, highlighting the 1,516 qualified nursing vacancies.

They also pointed to a 24% increase, from 464 to 577, in "hard-to-fill posts" which are vacant for over three months, as well as the rising agency staff costs.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) in Scotland warned that "nursing recruitment and retention remains in crisis".

Chairwoman Tracy McFall said: "For the last two years the Scottish Executive has made nurse recruitment and retention a priority but nurses across Scotland have not seen a difference in the workplace.

"Today's vacancy figures indicate that this crisis is not yet over and that policies have yet to make an impact on the ground."

Nationalists said nurse and consultant vacancies were now at "an all-time high".

Ministerial interference

The party's health spokeswoman Shona Robison said: "Good management and effective admin are essential, but under Labour, red tape is strangling the health service.

"Just one example is the bill for agency nurses.

"Using middlemen to employ nursing staff is costing over �28m, almost �4m more than last year, yet bizarrely, we are actually getting less for our money."

Scots Tory health spokesman David Davidson said the workforce figures gave "a picture of an NHS struggling to cope", and claimed many of the health service's ills were due to ministerial interference.