One Norwich Practices made workers redundant after collapse

One Norwich Practices (ONP) - which was in charge of the centre, its joining GP surgery and various other health services - collapsed last year amid financial turmoil.

It was announced in October the organisation would be going into liquidation owing £1.4m, creating uncertainty around the future of its services and the people working for it.

Now, as more details of the collapse emerge, it has been revealed that while a majority of its workforce was transferred to new providers, around a dozen lost their jobs as a result of the crisis.

David White, ONP's former chairman, told councillors at a meeting of Norfolk's health overview and scrutiny committee that "around 10 or a dozen" members of staff were made redundant.

Meanwhile, he shed new light on what went wrong at the organisation, which he joined as chairman on October 10.

He said that executive directors would provide inconsistent or incorrect information to its board members and that the company suffered from "inadequate management".

He said: "It became very clear to me very early on that this was a company that was not a going concern.

"I am told the board was given reports sometimes with very large overspends and sometimes with very large underspends with no explanations offered.

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"Key financial information was not given to the board so it was impossible for the board to fully understand the position of the company."

He added that Norwich City Council leader Mike Stonard, a non-executive director of ONP with responsibility for finance, had "personally strove to improve the financial reporting and management" of the organisation.

The Norfolk and Waveney integrated care board is due to hold a review into the company's collapse - but a date for this is yet to be set.