NHS chief ’s £410k payoff despite Hunt pledge to end fat cat deals
A DECISION to pay a £410,000 ‘golden goodbye’ to an NHS executive was attacked as ‘disgraceful’ yesterday.
David Flory received a ‘termination payment’ of between £410,000 and £415,000 on top of his £210,000 salary when he stepped down after three years as chief executive of the NHS Trust Development Authority (TDA).
The body oversees NHS trusts and made the payout despite the health service suffering the worst funding crisis in a generation, and most trusts running massive deficits.
Health unions reacted with fury to the payoff and demanded to know if Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt had signed off the deal. Mr Hunt announced tough measures to limit NHS ‘fat cat’ pay after revelations by the Daily Mail’s Investigations Unit about extraordinary remuneration deals being claimed by failing NHS chiefs.
He vowed to ‘stop the abuse’ after it was revealed that NHS bosses had given themselves £35million in pay rises.
Mr Flory was part of the Health Secretary’s inner circle of advisers, who were accused of micromanaging the NHS and failing to tackle widespread budget deficits.
He has worked in the NHS at executive level for more than 20 years and was previously the director general of NHS finance, performance and operations.
Annual accounts showed he received a salary worth £205,000 to £210,000 plus pension benefits – understood to have taken his total remuneration package close to £235,000 per year.
He was also given a settlement worth £410,000 to £415,000 after finishing his ‘fixed-term’ three-year appointment with the TDA.
The settlement was agreed before it was announced that NHS payouts would be capped at £160,000, and MPs are considering a public sector cap of £95,000.
Mr Flory announced in March that he was standing down from the TDA, which has since merged with another NHS regulator, Monitor, to form NHS Improvement.
Mr Hunt paid a glowing tribute to his ‘wise counsel, advice and judg- ment’ and his ‘real commitment to doing the right thing for patients’.
However, the settlement was attacked as ‘outrageous’ by public sector unions.
Unite’s national officer for health Barrie Brown called it ‘a disgraceful reward for a mediocre performance’.
He said: ‘Legislation before MPs aims to cap all public sector payoffs at £95,000 before Christmas – David Flory’s payoff is four times that amount.
‘How many more public sector bosses are going to sneak under the wire with outrageous payoffs before the legislation comes into force?’
The GMB union’s national organiser for the NHS Rehana Azam questioned if Mr Hunt had signed off the payment.
She said: ‘Three quarters of trusts are showing a deficit. How has the value of a package this size been determined against such bleak NHS forecasts?’
Mr Flory’s pay settlement was agreed by the Department of Health because he was entitled to a severance payment of up to £415,000 in his previous role of chief executive of the North East Strategic Health Authority when it was abolished under the NHS reforms in 2012.
A Department of Health spokesman said: ‘This reflects over 20 years at board level where his dedication and exceptional service were invaluable to the NHS.
‘However, we understand public concern about executive pay, which is why we’re clamping down on senior NHS managers’ salaries and capping redundancy pay.’