DOZENS of NHS workers successfully claimed compensation from Barnsley Hospital having been injured, assaulted or traumatised by events in the workplace.
A total of £50,068 made its way to 32 claimants over five years, data from the Liability to Third Parties Scheme (LTPS) - the NHS staff insurance pool - reveals.
Barnsley fared much better than its South Yorkshire neighbours, which saw Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals fork out £1.22m, Sheffield Teaching Hospitals pay £480,820 and Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust pay £454,919.
The figures, as of April 2026, show that the NHS nationally handed out £98.97m in direct damages to injured employees across successfully settled claims.( The total financial hit to the taxpayer is vastly higher than direct payouts alone, however, as settled claims where staff won compensation saw £86.56m spent purely on legal fees.( This breaks down to £19.12m covering the NHS’s own legal defence costs and £67.44m covering the claimants’ legal costs. ( Meanwhile, fees racked up by successfully-defended claims cost £5.26m for the NHS, with £144,055 going towards claimants’ legal costs. ( This brings the grand total paid out across England to £190.9m between 2020/21 and 2024/25, a figure that could yet increase as more claims are closed.
Patrick Mallon, from Accident Claims Advice, said: “Hospitals and healthcare facilities should be environments of safety and healing, but this data shows an alarming reality for the people keeping our health service afloat. ( “To see more than 1,000 healthcare workers sue the NHS after being assaulted or falling on the job points to a systemic failure of basic workplace protection.( “Diverting more than £190m away from patient care to fund injury damages and legal battles is a tragedy for an already cash-strapped service.
“Frontline staff have a legal right to a safe environment, and if trusts fail to provide it, workers must continue to use the legal system to protect their health and livelihoods.”
In a bid to clamp down on violence, some parts of Barnsley Hospital were assigned body-worn cameras in high-risk areas such as A and E, after it was revealed that one in seven staff experienced physical violence from members of the public last year - a rise of 13 per cent on the previous year.
Danny Mortimer, director general for NHS England, added: “These figures paint a deeply worrying picture of the abuse our hard-working NHS staff face.
“Staff safety and wellbeing is paramount, and we want everyone experiencing any kind of unwanted incident to feel confident enough to report it.
“But while that behaviour is completely unacceptable, we must look at what more we can do to support the people who keep our services running.
“We know about the everyday pressures staff face - such as not being able to get decent food on a night shift - and we haven’t moved fast enough to fix them.
“Staff have worked so hard to improve NHS performance and deliver care over winter as shown in the latest performance figures.
“These survey results show it is now for the NHS to deliver improvements for staff because there is so much more to do to make the NHS a better place to work.”
A Barnsley Hospital spokesperson told the Chronicle: “The health, safety and wellbeing of all of our colleagues is paramount and a wide range of measures to create a safe, supportive working environment are in place and regularly reviewed.
“Training and security measures like body-worn cameras have been introduced to combat incidents of aggression and abuse, and all colleagues have access to wellbeing and mental health resources, and dedicated occupational health support.
“Last year, we were one of the first UK acute trust hospitals to achieve the ‘Secured Environments’ accreditation and the BS7958 certification for CCTV management.”
Visit accidentclaimsadvice.org.uk for more information.
