Recommendation 14

NHSE has estimated that the NHS was around 16% less productive in 2021 than before the pandemic.29 NHSE’s internal analysis indicated that this drop in productivity was not solely due to immediate pandemic pressures, but also resulted from staff being less likely to work paid or unpaid overtime, and a reduced management focus by NHSE and NHS trusts on cost control and operational rigour.30 In responding to our questions about how it is practically addressing the productivity problem, NHSE said that the work had to begin at the level of individual providers. It told us that a provider should begin by working through available data to understand the specific issues it was facing, in order to come up with a plan to improve productivity. It indicated that it would be leading this kind of process throughout the country during the next annual planning round.31 New programmes and initiatives for recovery