West Hertfordshire Hospitals Trust will NOT be fined £500,000 a month

According to NHS targets 92 per cent of patients should receive treatment within 18 weeks – and no-one should wait longer than 52 weeks.

West Herts - which runs Hemel Hempstead, Watford and St Albans hospitals - has been failing to meet these targets.

And in November it emerged Herts Valleys Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which oversees local healthcare, had plans to fine the trust around £500,000 a month.

However now the CCG say the trust has made “good progress”.  And they have confirmed the financial sanctions will not be levied against the trust.

A CCG spokesman said: “We have agreed with West Herts that they will not be fined for not meeting their waiting time targets during the 2018-19 period.”

When it was first reported that the CCG intended to fine the trust, data showed that 92 patients had been waiting for more than 52 weeks for treatment.

At one point there were 124.

Now there are reported to be just four patients who have been waiting for more than a year – and all of these delays are said to be as a result of  patient choice, with treatment dates already scheduled.