King's Fund on 'real workforce shortage' in hospitals

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David Cameron will use his first major speech since the Tory general election victory to renew his vow to boost NHS funding and create a "seven-day" service. Prof Chris Ham, chief executive of the King's Fund charity, said a seven-day NHS was "absolutely the right thing to do", but there was "a price-tag attached”. Mr Cameron will again commit to increasing budgets by at least £8 billion a year by 2020. Prof Ham said the £8bn pledge is "to be welcomed, but that will really help to keep existing services running, it won't fund all the new commitments we've heard of during the election campaign including seven-day working". He also said there was "real workforce shortage" in some fields, with hospitals "already struggling to recruit enough senior medical staff".