THE cost of employing temporary staff is forcing Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust to overspend by hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Since April, the Trust has overspent by £416,000 on salaries and wages, finance director Ian McCarley said at the last Trust board meeting.

The county's mental health services have overspent by £508,000 overall this financial year, with the cost of drugs also causing problems.

But it is the financial damage caused by wages that is giving the organisation the biggest headache.

Trust chief executive Sue Hunt said the problem was mainly caused by the low numbers of established members of staff that they could afford.

"We know it takes more than this to ensure there's a safe level of care," she said.

"Until we get the right number of established staff on wards, this will be the same."

Mrs Hunt said they had at least one consultant on sick leave, which meant employing a locum consultant at great expense.

Chairman John Calvert said he was surprised that the Trust was unable to take on new, permanent staff when it cost more to bring in agency workers.

Mrs Hunt said it was because of the risk of extra costs that could be incurred with permanent staff, such as redundancy payments, whereas temporary employees could be laid off without warning.

However, she said they needed to increase the number of staff they took on over the next few months.

"We need to sign up to the principle of increasing the number of staff we have," she said.

"We're talking to the Primary Care Trusts about the problem, because we don't believe the Trust can manage this alone."