Over one million 12 hour A&E waits this year as Lib Dems call on Chancellor to “winterproof” the NHS at the Budget

EMBARGO: 22.30 Tuesday 22nd October

• NHS braced for another winter crisis as figures reveal a 20% rise in 12 hour A&E waits so far this year
• Worst hit areas have seen a six-fold increase in 12 hour A&E waits compared to last year
• Lib Dems warn this is a “life or death” issue and call on government to announce new ring-fenced fund in the Budget to end winter crises in the health service

Over one million patients have faced waits of 12 hours or more in A&E in England so far this year, up a fifth compared to the same period last year, new data uncovered by the Liberal Democrats has revealed.

The House of Commons Library research, commissioned by the Liberal Democrats, shows there were a staggering 1.09 million 12 hour A&E waits between February and September this year. This is up 181,000 from 913,000 in the same period in 2023, or a rise of 20%, meaning the NHS is on course for even higher levels of A&E delays this year as it braces for yet another winter crisis. 

Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson Daisy Cooper said the figures show the Chancellor needs to “winterproof” the NHS at the Budget, warning this is an issue of “life and death” for patients.  The Royal College of Emergency Medicine has previously estimated that long A&E delays led to around 14,000 excess deaths last year, or 268 a week.

The data shows that overall one in 10 A&E attendances in England this year have seen a wait of 12 hours or more. However, in some areas the situation is even more stark. Blackpool Teaching Hospitals saw more than a quarter of A&E attendances this year experiencing a wait of 12 hours or more, higher than anywhere else in the country. This was followed by the Countess of Chester Trust with 24.1% of attendances taking longer than 12 hours, and United Lincolnshire with 21.1%. 

Royal Berkshire Foundation Trust saw a shocking six-fold increase in the number of 12 hour waits, the largest annual increase in the country. North Bristol also saw a huge increase in 12 hour waits, with a three-fold rise from 1,595 to 4,895. This was followed by Harrogate and District and Surrey and Sussex Trusts which each experienced increases of over 175%.

The Liberal Democrats have called on the Chancellor to launch a new fund at the Budget, to put an end to the annual winter crises in the health service. The £1.5 billion ring-fenced fund would be allocated over the next four years, to build resilience in hospital wards, A&E departments, ambulance services and patient discharging. The Party is also calling for a wider funding boost for the NHS in the Budget, including funding to increase the number of GPs, boost the number of NHS dentist appointments and fix crumbling hospitals.

Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader and Treasury spokesperson, Daisy Cooper MP said:

“These statistics lay bare just how stretched our NHS is as it braces for yet another winter crisis. Fixing these shockingly long A&E delays is literally a matter of life and death.

“The Conservative Party has left an appalling legacy of A&E departments struggling at both ends: overwhelmed with patients forced into A&E because they can’t access community care, as well as patients who are well enough to leave hospital but can’t because social care doesn’t exist.  

“The government must take urgent action to break the cycle of the annual winter crisis and that starts by making the NHS and social care their top priorities in the Budget. We need to see urgent action to winterproof the NHS, alongside reforms to shore up social care, so our health and care services no longer lurch from crisis to crisis.”

ENDS

Notes to Editors:

The data from the House of Commons Library can be found here. Original source: NHS England A&E Attendances (ECDS supplementary data). The data measures the amount of time patients spend in A&E after arriving before being admitted, transferred of discharged.

The data shows a comparison of the number of 12 hour waits between February 2023 and September 2023 and the number of 12 hour waits through the same period this year. Data started being recorded for 12 hour waits in February 2023 so it is not possible to compare January’s figures this year to last year’s. In Tab 1 there is data on the number of 12 hour waits through January 2024 to September 2024.

Notes from the Library:

Please note that the Trust level figures for the year to date, and for the comparison periods are only provided for Trusts which had a data entry in all relevant months. The Library has provided the monthly data for all Trusts in the final two tabs of the worksheet - marked raw data.

Research by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine can be found here.

Liberal Democrat plans to “winterproof” the NHS

The Liberal Democrats are calling for a Winter Taskforce to be created which would, for the first time, bring together a team of experts reporting directly to the Health Secretary, responsible for strengthening coordination across the NHS and allocating long-term funding and resources to prevent winter crises.

Over the past seven years, the government has announced an average of £376 million of emergency funding each year to tackle the NHS winter crisis. 

Under the Liberal Democrat proposal, the new Taskforce would instead manage a ringfenced fund of £1.5 billion over the next four years, to build resilience in hospital wards, A&E departments, ambulance services and patient discharging. This would allow integrated care boards and NHS Trusts to plan their budgets more efficiently to prevent winter crises, instead of just receiving emergency funding from the government at the last minute.