ICB Watch · NW NHS workforce evidence

NC&M (was Warrington & Halton) (Acute · Cheshire & Merseyside)

2026/27 — the year ahead

−118 WTEthe workforce reduction in its 2026/27 plan · a cost target expressed as posts, not a count of jobs. iWhat does a “workforce reduction” mean? Not always people losing their jobs. Boards count in WTE — units of one full-time post — and the routes differ in who they touch. Cutting agency work: paid work lost, but no NHS post existed. Cutting bank shifts: extra shifts mostly worked by the trust’s own staff — a pay cut that never shows in post counts. Freezing vacancies: no one is dismissed, but the post and its future job go, and the work lands on those who remain. Deleting posts shrinks the establishment itself. Voluntary exits: MARS is a paid resignation without redundancy rights; voluntary redundancy is redundancy on volunteered terms. Compulsory redundancy is the rarest route — boards report it separately in their audited accounts.The consolidated NC&M plan including Bridgewater; the savings (CIP) target converted into posts. Out-years: 304 (27/28), 247 (28/29).
Last year
Cut posts in 2025/26 — a WTE reduction. MARS-led (130 apps, leave by 31 Mar); no standalone 25/26 WTE-cut number. How they went about it: a voluntary exit (MARS) scheme ran and recruitment controls operated. The audited accounts record 1 compulsory redundancy in 2025/26. Against the workforce plan it submitted to NHS England for 2025/26, the trust ended March 2026 3.0% above 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. Documented: Bridgewater Community Healthcare absorbed (the NCM merger) — documented. The board’s own programme figures above are the usable evidence here.
Risks it carries
We do not hold this trust’s board risk register. This is a gap in our evidence, not a statement that the board records no serious risks. Ask your trust to publish its Board Assurance Framework with its board papers.
What staff say
28.2%say there are enough staff to do their jobtheir benchmark group: 31.3%
31.4%often or always feel burnt outtheir benchmark group: 32.4%
30.3%often think about leavingtheir benchmark group: 29.9%
NHS Staff Survey 2025 · compared with similar trusts iNHS Staff Survey 2025. The comparison figure is the average of the trust’s own “benchmark group” — the set of similar trusts NHS England compares it with.
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
  • Warrington & Halton delivered via MARS (130 applications, leavers by 31 Mar 2026). NC&M (W&H) Public Board — 1 April 2026
  • Warrington & Halton launched a MARS scheme as part of financial recovery / workforce reshaping. W&H Council of Governors — 12 February 2026 · p.18
  • Warrington & Halton froze non-clinical vacancies. W&H Council of Governors — 12 February 2026
  • Audited exit packages, 2025/26. Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust — Annual Report and Accounts 2025/26, exit packages note (subject to audit) · p.148
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”).
CIP“cost improvement programme” — the NHS term for a savings plan.
MARS“mutually agreed resignation scheme” — a voluntary paid-exit scheme.
Establishmentthe number of funded posts a trust plans to employ — its budgeted staffing level — whether or not each post is filled. Removing a vacancy from the establishment cuts the planned staffing level without anyone losing a job.
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.