Health secretary says bad managers are NHS’s ‘guilty secret’ in broadcast round ahead of first major speech on health service reform

In an interview with LBC Wes Streeting claimed there were “lots” of poor managers in the NHS. Asked about opposition to his plans, he said”

Look, I know it’s not going to be popular with everyone in the system. I think people would rather sometimes that I got everyone around the campfire to sing Kumbaya and hailed the great religion of the National Health Service and how wonderful it is. But when it’s going through the worst crisis in its history, I think we need to drive serious change.

That does mean more support for leaders, and today I’m not only talking about more freedoms and autonomy for our best performing leaders, but investment in leadership, development and training.

I’m not interested in humiliating individuals. What I am interested in is performance, managing poor leaders on and out of the NHS. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable thing when the average very senior managers play is £145,000 a year. The level of responsibility they carry is enormous. They’re responsible for a vital public service, and if they’re not up to it in a very professional way, we need to manage people onto another future.