Locum doctors overpaid for every shift
Despite the government introducing a cap on agency staff fees last year, hospitals overspent by £26.6m between 1 February and 31 March on locum doctors, with consultant locums being paid 27% above the cap for April and some junior doctors receiving 50% above. In addition, 85% of daytime shifts and 56% of out-of-hours shifts were paid above the cap, according to figures released by Liaison Financial Services, a company that provides insight and advice into hospital finance. The British Medical Association (BMA) said the caps are detrimental to hospitals and the government should look at the underlying reasons behind the use of locums, such as underfunding, recruitment and retention of staff.

Locum doctors are still being paid vastly over the odds for the majority of hospital shifts, a new report has revealed.

Despite the Government introducing a cap late last year on how much medics can earn per shift, consultants are routinely being paid almost a third more than they should be.

And some junior doctors are being paid double the hourly rate hospitals agreed to stick to.

While officials say the cap has saved £300 million since October, hospitals are still overspending almost £3 million a week on agency staff, the figures show.

Locum doctors are still being paid vastly over the odds for the majority of hospital shifts, a report has revealed. This is despite the Government introducing a cap to limit agency staff's pay (file photo)

In total, hospitals overspent a total of £26.6m on temporary staff in just nine weeks from 1 February to 31 March this year.

One theory is that a staffing crisis in the NHS - both permanent staff and locums - has meant hospitals have had to keep their rates competitive.

Before the cap was introduced locum doctors typically earned £1,760 a shift.

This was the equivalent to £240,000 a year – more than three times the £75,000 average salary for consultants.

The figures were released by Liaison, a company that manages hospital finances.

Agency costs have been blamed for fuelling the highest deficit in the history of the NHS, with £3.6 bn spent on such workers in 2014/15.

Just last week, statistics revealed the NHS is in it's worst financial state in history - now £2.54bn in debt.

New rules were drawn up to cap the amount which could be spent on any shift, with limits due to be steadily reduced between November last year and April this year.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt introduced a cap on how much locums can be paid per shift in November, after the NHS spent £3.3bn on agency staff last year

As of last month, NHS trusts are not allowed to pay agency staff more than 55 per cent extra than it costs to pay a member of staff for a shift.

But the Liaison figures reveal 85 per cent of daytime shifts and 56 per cent of out-of-hours shifts were paid above the caps that were in place in February and March.

Almost all shifts for junior doctors were paid more than the limit.

In April, consultants working daytime shifts were due to be paid £76 an hour.

But they were paid an average of £104 – 27 per cent higher than the cap.

And junior doctors - due to be earn between £25 and £36 an hour depending on their seniority -were paid between £50 and £63 an hour – an amount which is 42-50 per cent above the limit.

While locum at junior doctors level have seen their hourly rate fall from between 1 per cent and 7 per cent since the cap was introduced in November, consultants have seen their pay rise.

They are no paid an average of £101.46 an hour – 2 per cent higher than their rate last year.

Ian Wilson, of the British Medical Association, told The Times the caps are hurting hospitals that are already struggling to recruit doctors.

He said: 'Doctors have serious concerns about the impact these caps will have, particularly the risk that they will penalise regions and specialties where recruitment and retention is already a problem.

'It would be much better to look at why organisations cannot fund or recruit the numbers they need.'