A RECOVERY plan to treat Burnley Health Trust's ailing finances will be presented to directors next month.

But staff have been warned there is no simple panacea for the financial ills and the remedy could be painful.

In a letter to staff, chief executive David Chew has warned that for the first time in its history the Trust will be overspent by between £1million to £1.8 million and this will have to be remedied.

He says it could take three years for matters to be put right. A recovery plan announced in August was not extensive enough to meet the current overheating and "a more purposeful and far-reaching version is needed".

He says: "All services will have to live within their budgeted levels and hard decisions will need to be taken."

Mr Chew says increasing patient demand has meant the trust spending £250,000 more on waiting lists than planned; the winter pressure plan reckons on the trust coping with 10 per cent more cases than last year - costing around £750,000.

He adds: "This is the toughest time of year for acute trusts and this year we have the added pressure of the millennium.

"I hope winter is kind to us."

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