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Financial Report

Finance Director’s report

Barts and The London recorded a surplus on its income and expenditure account of £7.5m million in 2008/09. This means that we met the key financial duty of achieving break-even (or better) for the eighth successive year. Achieving this surplus required an enormous amount of work from staff throughout the Trust to meet the best value and cost improvement targets set while continuing to deliver high quality care to patients. In overall terms, the Trust had to bridge a funding gap of £40.0 million, either by reducing its costs or by generating additional income. The challenge will continue into 2009/10 and beyond as the Trust needs to be prepared to meet changing policy directives and income flows that require us to deliver cost reductions and efficiency gains greater than those achieved in 2008/09. If the current trends in prices and inflation continue, we may face further challenges meeting cost increases above the increases in our payment by results tariff and other income.

The Financial Year 2008/09 is the last year that UK Generally Accepted Accounting Principles will be used by the NHS. From 1 April 2009, the NHS will be adopting International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). As part of the adoption process and in order to provide comparative financial figures for the 2009/10 Financial Accounts, the 2008/09 Financial Accounts will be restated using IFRS. Adoption of the standards in 2009/10 will change the accounting for a number of key areas including reclassification of some operating leases and the Trust’s PFI. The financial impact of these changes is likely to be significant.

In preparation for this a considerable amount of work has taken place within the Trust. An IFRS steering group was formed to oversee and coordinate the IFRS compliance work. This group was chaired by the Director of Finance. The group was responsible for assessing the impact of each of the new accounting standards, revising the Trust’s accounting policies, ensuring that key staff were trained where necessary and restatement of the 2008/09 opening Balance Sheet.

I would like to highlight the following achievements of the Finance and Investment Directorate:

  • Met the reduced faster closure timetable for the Annual Financial Accounts. The timetable reduced the allowable time to submit the Draft Financial Accounts by eight days
  • Achieving the planned savings and efficiencies
  • Extension to E-procurement
  • Combination of three separate Internal Audit functions into one large consortium employed by BLT
  • Continued roll-out of Service Line Reporting to 15 specialties with support from an external company
  • Cash releasing savings of £5.14m were achieved during financial year 2008/09 which takes the cumulative total to over £29m since we started the best value programme in 2003
  • The investment in web-enabled technology has allowed the Trust to make significant transactional cost savings, and 75% of purchase orders are now actioned directly by the clinical directorates themselves (providing relevant tools that enable front line staff to manage their activities more efficiently).

Andrew Holden Director of Finance

 

Summary financial statements 2008/09

These accounts for the year ended 31 March 2009 have been prepared by the Barts and The London NHS Trust under section 232, schedule 15, of the National Health Service Act 2006, in the form which the Secretary of State has, with the approval of the Treasury, directed.

The full annual accounts, including the Trust's Statement on Internal Control 2008/09, can be obtained from the Director of Finance, Finance Directorate, Barts and The London NHS Trust, 9 Prescot Street, London E1 8PR.

These accounts were considered by the Board of Directors on 27 May 2009 and signed on their behalf.

Peter Morris Interim Chief Executive

Andrew Holden Director of Finance

 

Independent auditors’ statement to the directors of the board of Barts and The London NHS Trust

We have examined the summary financial statements which comprise the Income and Expenditure Account, Balance Sheet, Statement of Recognised Gains & Losses, Cashflow Statement and Remuneration report, in addition to explanatory notes on the Better Payments Practice Code, Management Costs, Operating Expenses, Audit Fees, Income and Purchasers. These are set out on pages 36 to 42.

This report is made solely to the Board of Directors of Barts & the London NHS Trustin accordance with Part II of the Audit Commission Act 1998 and for no other purpose, as set out in paragraph 36 of the Statement of Responsibilities of Auditors and of Audited Bodies prepared by the Audit Commission.

Respective responsibilities of directors and auditors

The Directors are responsible for preparing the Annual Report. 

Our responsibility is to report to you our opinion on the consistency of the summary financial statement within the Annual Report with the statutory financial statements. 

We also read the other information contained in the Annual Report and consider the implications for my report if we become aware of any misstatements or material inconsistencies with the summary financial statement.

Basis of audit opinion

We conducted our work in accordance with Bulletin 1999/6 ‘The auditors’ statement on the summary financial statement’ issued by the Auditing Practices Board. Our report on the statutory financial statements describes the basis of our audit opinion on those financial statements.

Opinion

In our opinion the summary financial statement is consistent with the statutory financial statements of the Trustfor the year ended 31 March 2009. We have not considered the effects of any events between the date on which we signed our report on the statutory financial statements 27 May 2009 and the date of this statement.

R.J. Tremeer
Senior Statutory Officer on behalf of Grant Thornton UK LLP
Grant Thornton UK LLP

Download Annual Financial Accounts 08/09 - Note, large download.