CFO departed trust after senior staff and ICB ‘lost confidence’

As well as the concerns from the two senior trust staff, West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals Trust’s CEO received a letter from Hertfordshire and West Essex ICB saying it had lost confidence in the trust’s financial leadership, and raising “increasing concerns” over transparency.

Both letters, seen by HSJ, were sent to the trust chief Matthew Coats in February. In a message on 8 March, Mr Coats told staff that chief financial officer Don Richards had taken the decision to step down.

Sources told HSJ  that Mr Richards, who had been the trust’s CFO for 10 years, is taking legal advice over the matter.

His departure was not mentioned in trust board papers, but Rodney Pindai had taken over as acting chief financial officer by the April public board meeting.

Sources have suggested the allegations made in the letters about Mr Richards are contested.

Letter from trust individuals

Two senior trust staff wrote to Mr Coats to “formally” express concerns over Mr Richards in a letter dated 22 February.

The pair said: “Since the size of the financial predicament of the trust became apparent in Q3 of the 23/24 financial year, he has increasingly disregarded our concerns that his plan to restore financial stability would be at the cost of patient safety, and reverse the hard work done to reduce the significant number of patients waiting over 52 weeks for treatment.”

The letter said: “A blanket 3% reduction of clinical staff is not a logical approach to ensuring that safe care can be delivered, but our proposals to review each are individually met with derision, and allegations of bias towards him.

“We therefore have no choice, but to inform you that we have no confidence in his ability to remain as the chief financial officer of our trust.”

The trust did not respond to questions on whether the reductions took place.

Board papers show “discussions” were happening with divisions over a 3 per cent establishment cut in late 2023. 

ICB concerns

Meanwhile, in a separate letter, also dated in February, six days earlier, Hertfordshire and West Essex ICB told Mr Coats there had been “increasing concerns about the transparency” of the trust’s financial position.

The letter said leaders had “lost confidence in the leadership of the financial function within the trust”.

It raised concerns over “long-standing patterns of your trust’s finance function leadership behaviour”, citing “considerable defensiveness in response to legitimate and constructive challenge”.

Financial position

It comes in a period of very tight NHS finances and many trusts being asked to make deep efficiencies, including some cases of freezing and reducing clinical staffing.

WHTH ended 2023-24 with a near £14m deficit, after its position was improved with a cash injection of a similar size from the ICB. It had started the year with a breakeven plan, which was later revised to an £18m forecast deficit.

It has set a £5.4m deficit plan for this year, July board papers suggest, with a 5 per cent efficiency improvement which equates to £26m.

The trust plans to reduce its staff in post by 5.3 per cent this year, board papers show, although some of this is understood to be linked to a new outsourced pathology service.

The organisation said its financial position requires some strict workforce controls, although these are focused on non-clinical staff.

Both the trust and ICB declined to comment. Mr Richards declined to comment but said he expected a joint statement would be provided by the trust.

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