Bridgewater Community Healthcare (Community · Cheshire & Merseyside)
2026/27 — the year ahead
See NC&M card. 25/26 history stays here: MARS launched jointly with W&H, benefits deferred to 27/28. Absorbed into NC&M — 2026/27 figures live on the NC&M card.
Last year
No 2025/26 workforce reduction target found in the papers we hold. MARS launched 25/26, benefits deferred to 27/28 (no 25/26 number). How they went about it: a voluntary exit (MARS) scheme ran. Against the workforce plan it submitted to NHS England for 2025/26, the trust ended March 2026 6.2% below the level its own plan set for that month, counting total staff in post (substantive plus bank and agency) (read from the Cheshire & Merseyside system report’s monitoring chart).
Who was cut
The national payroll count is not usable for this trust this year. Whole services — and their staff — moved between organisations during the year, so the count would mix those transfers with genuine cuts. The board’s own programme figures above are the usable evidence here.
Risks it carries
Bridgewater Community Healthcare ceased to exist as an NHS trust on 31 March 2026. It was acquired by Warrington & Halton Teaching Hospitals, which became North Cheshire and Mersey NHS Foundation Trust (NC&M) on 1 April 2026 — there is no longer a Bridgewater board to publish a risk register. For the merged organisation, see the NC&M card.
What staff say
23.5%say there are enough staff to do their jobtheir benchmark group: 34.5%
33.6%often or always feel burnt outtheir benchmark group: 26.7%
39.1%often think about leavingtheir benchmark group: 26.1%
Why the cuts?
No explicit reason stated — none found in the public record. iNo explicit reason for the workforce reduction appears anywhere in the public board papers we hold and coded. Reasons may have been discussed in private session — we are not privy to those discussions; we record what the public papers show. Where the trust has published a savings requirement, that context appears on this card, and readers can weigh it for themselves.
On the record — the board’s own papers & where every figure comes from
- Bridgewater Community 2024/25 WTE plan — 147 WTE bank staff reduction required (FSC report to the Board, Nov 2024; in the Feb 2025 CoG pack) Council of Governors Papers 20 February 2025 · p.45
- Bridgewater Community 2024/25 WTE plan — 68 WTE bank staff reduction required, revised down from 147 (FSC 16 Dec 2024; in the Feb 2025 CoG pack) Council of Governors Papers 20 February 2025 · p.50
- Bridgewater (BCH) launched a MARS scheme (joint w/ WHH) to create vacancies. NC&M committees-in-common Board — 3 December 2025 · p.244
Sources: the trust’s own board papers (cited above) · NHS England workforce statistics (Apr→Apr, our arithmetic) · NHS Staff Survey 2025 · every figure is traceable to the evidence ledger on the audit twin of this page
Plain-English key
WTE / FTEtwo names for the same measure — one full-time post’s worth of paid staff time (two half-time staff count as one). It is a unit of time, not a count of people: a reduction of 100 WTE can mean fewer people, fewer hours, or fewer bank and agency shifts, and is usually a mix. Boards plan and report in WTE across all staff — permanent, bank and agency together — and so does this card, which says which of those a figure counts. Boards write WTE (“whole-time equivalent”); the national statistics write FTE (“full-time equivalent”).
MARS“mutually agreed resignation scheme” — a voluntary paid-exit scheme.
Substantivepermanently employed staff, as opposed to bank or agency staff.
Benchmark groupthe set of similar trusts NHS England compares each trust with in the staff survey.