Recommendation 19

Exit packages are payments made in relation to redundancy and other departure costs for employees. Special severance payments are a subset of exit packages, relating to any non–contractual payments to employees.31 We have repeatedly raised issues with the Department or its organisations making inappropriate or unapproved payments. In June 2022, the previous Committee found that three Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) had approved and paid special severance payments without following the required authorisation process. One of these payments resulted in the C&AG qualifying his regularity audit opinion on the NHS England 2020–21 Annual Report and Accounts. The previous Committee warned in 2022 that planned large–scale NHS restructuring increased the risk of future payoffs and further non–compliance with the rules. It recommended that the Department should set out how it would monitor and control the approval of all redundancy payments made by entities within the Departmental Group.32 The Department agreed with our recommendation, and told us in its response to our report that detailed written guidance relating to exit payment processes and approvals had been circulated to CCGs and the (then) proposed ICBs, and that separate arrangements were in place for NHS Trusts and Foundation Trusts.33