Spending on temporary hospital staff soars by 81 per cent

ITV News can reveal that NHS trusts in London and the South East are spending 81 per cent more on temporary staff than they were five years ago.

Figures obtained under the freedom of information act show the average trust now spends £43 million a year on filling gaps.

Those gaps are large, 13 per cent of jobs in London and the home counties' hospitals are unfilled.

The situation at Watford General Hospital is reflected across the capital, a place where 1 in 5 jobs is currently vacant.

Hospitals are struggling to find permanent staff, leaving trusts with little choice by to employ agency staff.

The trust that spends more than any other on agency staff is BARTS. At Whipps Cross university Hospital, one of the trust's hospitals, financial problems resulted in poor care.

One of the victims of those inadequacies was Kenneth Lowe, who died at Whipp's Cross Hospital last year. The family were told on January 1 2014 Mr Lowe had cancer in three places - the liver, lung and stomach, and had "just under a year to live", but died four days later in hospital.

His Family say, there simply weren't enough staff to look after him.

Barts Health Trust has since apologised for the poor care that Kenneth Lowe received. It says it has since recruited 500 extra nurses.

The Royal College of Nurses says the shortage can attributed to cost of living in the capital, the NHS wage they receive leaves them worse off than nurses elsewhere in the country.

Part of the government's solution is to introduce a pay cap on how much nurses can be paid per hour.

From Monday it is setting a maximum hourly rate for agency nurses, putting a total cap on agency staff spending for NHS trusts in financial trouble, and banning unscrupulous agencies.

Could this cap on agency staff spending affect patient care this winter? Some say it will.

The NHS accepts the government's cap will make life more difficult for trusts.

When Jeremy Hunt makes his announcement on Monday, we'll begin to discover how much pressure trusts are likely to be under this winter.