NHS hospital trusts paying hundreds of millions in interest to private firms

Exclusive: Guardian analysis of hospital trust accounts found 101 owe about 50bn in future unitary PFI payments

NHS trusts spent close to a half a billion pounds on interest charges from private companies for private finance initiative (PFI) contracts last year - equivalent to the salaries of 15,000 newly qualified nurses.

Hospital groups spent 2.3bn on legacy PFI projects in 2020-21, of which just under 1bn went on costs for essential services such as cleaning and maintenance. A third of the remaining PFI spend - 457m - went purely on paying off interest charges.