Recommendation 22

Some hospices have recently reduced the volume or range of services they provide and others are planning to do so, at a time when demand for palliative and end-of-life care is rising.45 Hospice UK told us that hospices are facing a cliff edge from April, and if no new funding is injected into the sector before the new financial year, hospices would be forced to reduce services further.46 It told us of hospices that have already announced staff redundancies.47 We received submissions from several hospices telling us that they were operating deficits, including annual deficits of £780,000 for Mary Ann Evans Hospice and £1.1 million for Rotherham Hospice. Marie Curie told us it is currently running a structural operating deficit.48 The Committee referred to three hospices—Prospect hospice in Swindon, Birmingham hospice and St Giles hospice in Lichfield—which have announced redundancies or have closed in-patient beds.49