Value for money?
Updated on 08 March 2006
Exclusive: We reveal how new privately run treatment centres were paid millions for operations never carried out.
>>Watch the report
It has debts of £800 million, its chief executive has resigned, staff are being laid off and one hospital is even closing to new admissions. All the signs of an NHS in crisis?
And if that wasn't enough - Channel Four News has discovered that the Government has handed over millions of pounds to the private sector to pay for operations that have not even been carried out.
And we have uncovered the existence of a £100 million fund to pay the private sector for the extra costs of these contracts.
In this exclusive report - our social affairs correspondent Victoria Macdonald asks, at a time of cash crisis - can this really be value for money?
