Corporate
13. Research, Development and Innovation finances
13.1 Introduction
The purpose of this paper is to present the financial performance of the Research, Development & Innovation (RD&I) Division for the period to the end of March 2025 (Month 12 2024/25). The dashboard included within Appendix 1 provides an overview of the position.
13.2 Financial performance to March 2025
The reported financial position for the RD&I Division at the end of March 2025 is an overspend of £131k. The composition of the overspend is set out by area in the table below.
Key Financial Target 1: to remain within monthly budget expectations
The divisional overspend is predominantly down to overspends against non-pay budgets. This is due to increased ophthalmology costs, essential equipment and additional costs relating to 2023/24 that were not provided for (£66k) which had been previously assumed to be funded via charity.
Performance against income has been broadly in line with target, however, underspends against pay have seen the overspends mitigated in part creating an overall variance against budget of £131k.
The greatest area of risk across the division is income. There is a significant income target of £5m for the 2024/25 financial year which includes an additional savings target of £150k for increased commercial trials income. Whilst, overall, income delivery is currently in line with target, this is an area that will continue to be closely monitored as conversations regarding the delivery of targeted savings for 2025/26 continue.
The trajectory of income received in year compared to historical trends is set out with Appendix 1. The year-to-date position is shown below:
Income Analysis by category:
Key Financial Target 2: to pay at least 95% of invoices within 30 days:
The PPP compliance target is to pay 95% of invoices within 30 days. Despite unplanned staff absences throughout the year and ongoing recruitment within the team, the current month position has continued to improve (from 92% to 98%). Recruitment for the vacant posts is currently underway to ensure that ongoing performance is supported and through the task and finish group processes continue to be reviewed with measures and lessons resulting from the group being cascaded to the team.
13.3 Delivery of savings
The outturn position demonstrates that the establishment control savings have been delivered in in full. Increased commercial trials income has, however, underachieved against target by £281k. Although this has been mitigated by Welsh Government and other income there remains an underachievement against income targets overall. The table in Appendix 1 demonstrates that 13% of the 2024/25 savings has not been delivered.
The underachievement against commercial income will need to be closely monitored throughout next year as there are additional savings targets that have been attributed to commercial trials income. This is a risk that will need to be carefully managed.
During the 2025/26 financial year, where it is anticipated that full delivery of savings is not possible, there is an expectation that mitigation will be identified as failure to manage this situation appropriately has the potential to have consequences; not only on the Divisional position but also the position reported to Trust Board.
13.4 IMTP
The Chief Executive has submitted their Accountable Officer Letter 2025/26 – 2027/28 to the Director General of Health and Social Services and Chief Executive of NHS Wales. The Accountable Officer is directly accountable for all financial performance issues (and all other performance issues) delegated to the organisation. The letter sets out the draft IMTP assumptions and risks and confirms that whilst the draft financial plan sets out achievement of a balanced budget over the IMTP three-year period, in order to achieve this the Trust will have to achieve as a minimum a challenging savings target of 2.8%.
The Velindre University NHS Trust draft IMTP was approved by Trust Board on the 27th of March 2025 and submitted to WG. Formal approval from WG is still awaited.
SMART action plans are being developed by Service Leads. These plans will be used to ensure savings are successfully delivered, and aid continued monitoring throughout the year.
13.5 Conclusion
Budget holders have a delegated responsibility to ensure that they manage within their budgets.
Budget holders will/have been having key meetings with their finance business partners to agree their budgets for 2025/26 and if there are any areas of concern then this should be addressed prior to the budget upload that will take place at the end of April 2025.
13.6 RD&I revenue dashboard FY2024/25
