NHS faces 'perfect storm' this winter as doctors warn two-thirds of A&Es are 'unsafe' and call for immediate action to 'avert disaster'

Ministers must take immediate action to 'avert disaster' in A&Es this winter with two-thirds 'unsafe' and almost all woefully unprepared, leading doctors have warned.

Dangerous overcrowding, corridor care and unrelenting demand will create a 'perfect storm' - and current government plans 'won't cut it', the Royal College of Emergency Medicine said.

Emergency departments are already failing to cope after enduring their busiest summer on record and staff are braced for a further onslaught, it added.

The RCEM described the current situation as a 'disgraceful state of affairs' and said it 'beggars belief' that hospitals are going into winter with almost 1,000 fewer beds than last year when an estimated 500 patients died every week due to overcrowding.

Its new survey of 163 doctors in charge of A&Es across the country reveals more than nine in ten (91 per cent) are either 'very' or 'extremely' concerned about the pressure their departments will experience this winter.

Only 3 per cent said they are 'well prepared' for the coming months.

Around two-thirds (65 per cent) said their emergency departments are under more pressure now than they were a year ago and 60 per cent described theirs as 'actively unsafe'.

Almost nine in ten (89 per cent) described current pressure as 'high' or 'very high'.

Emergency departments 'are already failing to cope after enduring their busiest summer on record and staff are braced for a further onslaught' (stock image)

Ian Higginson, president of the RCEM, said: 'We are not managing now and we simply are not ready for winter.

'We have patients scattered all over our departments, many stuck in trolleys or on chairs for hours upon hours.

'The sickest and most injured among them can't get into a hospital bed and end up staying with us, sometimes for days.

'It's a disgraceful state of affairs and I cannot believe it has been allowed to get this bad.

'Patients are dying unnecessarily every week whilst politicians continue to focus on the wrong solutions.'

The results come just days after Health Secretary Yvette Cooper warned the NHS faces a more challenging winter than normal and announced £140million of funding for urgent care in England.

The RCEM welcomed the investment but cautioned the money is 'not being spent in the right places'. It has written to Ms Cooper with suggestions.

Dr Higginson said: 'With year-round pressure hitting departments, the vast majority of us have no spare capacity to help deal with the cold months.

'It was not always this way. Less than a decade ago, the annual NHS 'winter crisis' was declared when waiting times and overcrowding reached a fraction of what we now experience throughout the year.

'We've now got to the point where we can't tell where one crisis ends and the next begins.

'We need governments from all four nations to step up, heed our warning - and act now. Not in a few years, or even a few months - now.

'Existing winter preparations represent the same old same old, and will yield the same disastrous results.

'Our clinical leads agree.

'Knowing that, it beggars belief that we are going into winter with nearly a thousand fewer beds than last year, and with recruitment freezes stopping us recruiting doctors and nurses to help reduce risk for our patients or to get hospitals working.'

The latest NHS England data shows there was an average of 3,310 patients who received corridor care each day in September, with 2,549 in A&E departments and 761 in other hospital areas.

This is up from an average of 2,865 per day in August, made up of 2,297 in emergency departments and 568 in other areas.

Meanwhile, the number of people waiting more than 12 hours in A&E departments in England from a decision to admit to actually being admitted stood at 50,582 in September, up from 44,951 in August.

Dr Den Langhor, emergency medicine lead on the British Medical Association's consultants' committee, said: 'This warning from clinical leads echoes the fears of emergency medicine doctors working across the country as we head into winter.

'Having only just managed the busiest summer on record in emergency departments, we have not yet had time to take a moment to breathe before we face the onslaught of what we expect to be another horrific winter on the frontline.

'These pressures are no longer seasonal - they are continuous.'

Dr Vicky Price, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said: 'We cannot keep treating predictable pressures as unexpected emergencies.

'What is needed is sufficient staffed hospital capacity, effective discharge pathways and properly supported community and social care services to keep patients moving safely through the system.

'Patients deserve better than another winter of unacceptable waits and care in corridors.'

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said it had been preparing for a challenging winter 'for months', including opening 25 new and upgraded urgent and emergency care units.

They added: 'The Secretary of State has also tasked the NHS with accelerating plans to end corridor care, particularly for children, and for the first winter ever the NHS is publishing corridor care data to shine a light on where pressures are greatest and drive action where it is needed most.

'On top of this, we are expanding access to the flu vaccine and improving GP access through evening, weekend and out-of-hours appointments to reduce pressure on A&Es.'

Poundland could disappear from the High Street within days as Andy Burnham asks questions over how its owners handled a sales process.

Thousands of nervous staff are waiting to hear what will happen to the discount retailer after it filed a notice to appoint administrators with the High Court today.

This will give the business, bought by US investment firm Gordon Brothers for less than £1 last year, some breathing room – ten days – to find a rescue deal. AlixPartners is poised to take over a potential insolvency process.

But the Poundland brand and its 600 shops will not be sold as a whole, leading to a carve-up of the 36-year old retailer, meaning jobs are at risk at any shops that are not bought.

And on Thursday night, the Prime Minister said he is ready to demand answers from owners amid a 'deeply worrying time' for staff and their families.

Burnham told The Telegraph: 'We want to see jobs protected. If there was a potential owner to avoid this that hasn’t been accepted, then the Business Secretary and I want to know why that is the case.'

Battle for survival: The fate of Poundland's near 12,000 staff hangs in the balance.

It would mark the biggest high street collapse since Debenhams closed its doors in 2021 with the loss of 12,000 jobs.

Job losses could hit 600 shops and a distribution centre in Makerfield, Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s constituency, which employs around 270 people.

Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds also said he was ‘very much concerned’ and would push for answers as workers and bosses seethe over its failure to find a buyer.

He told The Telegraph: ‘If it is true that it was not necessary to put the business into administration then the present owners will have to account for that.’

Why has Poundland struggled?

Chains like Poundland are battling shoppers with constrained budgets while costs, such as employing people, have increased – following Government moves to hike wages and employer National Insurance contributions. Savvier shoppers are looking for cheaper online alternatives, including Amazon, Temu and TikTok Shop.

Former owners, the Warsaw-listed Pepco Group, made some wrong moves that did not go down well with its customers, including putting Pepco clothing in its shops.

Its most recent woes stem back to last year, when it narrowly avoided collapsing into administration. The chain was sold in June 2025 to US firm Gordon Brothers for a nominal €1 amid 'challenging trading conditions'.

By November 2025, around 100 Poundland shops had been shut or earmarked for closure. Two months later, as part of its radical turnaround plan, Poundland had shut 149 stores with 2,200 job losses.

But this year, Poundland bosses insisted it was turning a corner, pointing to like-for-like sales growth of 3.3 per cent in the three months to September 26.

Poundland's managing director Barry Williams said earlier this month: 'Our recovery plan is working, thanks to our investment in simple low pricing and new ranges, powered by our new in-house teams.'

Why is there a dispute between Poundland’s owners and its bosses?

Both shop workers’ union Usdaw and Poundland’s management have accused Gordon Brothers of mishandling a sales process, which it kicked off at the beginning of September.

The union met with the minister for the future of work, Kate Dearden, on Wednesday, amid warnings of what would be the biggest High Street collapse in years.

Three directors, appointed less than a fortnight ago, this week walked out following a dramatic dispute with owners Gordon Brothers.

Hours later the retailer’s management hit out at the owners, calling the process ‘unexpected, unwanted and avoidable’.

Government adviser David Bickerton is set to ask ‘fairly basic questions of senior people around Poundland’ in order to ‘establish what the situation is,’ on behalf of the business secretary, the Financial Times reported.

What does a notice to appoint administrators mean?

‘Filing a notice of intention isn’t administration itself,’ explains Julie Palmer, managing partner at real estate advisory group BTG.

Instead, it effectively keeps the wolves from the door for up to ten business days of protection and helps the firm preserve cash.

She added: ‘If an appointment follows, the administrators take control of the company from the directors. Their first duty is to try to rescue it as a going concern.

'If that isn’t possible, they aim for a better result for creditors than liquidation would give. In practice that usually means a sale, either of the whole business or in parts. For staff and customers, stores normally keep trading while that happens, but the risk is that the business is broken up, with stronger stores sold and weaker ones closed.’

Who could buy the shops?

Owner Gordon Brothers rejected a takeover offer from Irish real estate firm Martin Property Group – despite management and unions arguing this was the best deal on the table.

This would have been for the whole business, including its brand and full store estate.

But now it seems like other major retailers, especially those with grand expansion plans, could pick up some shops from Poundland.

The owner of The Range, Homebase and Wilko – known as Britain’s ‘Del Boy Billionaire’ – is thought to be interested. Chris Dawson, 74, who runs CDS Superstores, acquired the Wilko brand out of administration in 2023.

Dawson got his nickname, the 'Del Boy billionaire', via the press as a reference to his yellow Lamborghini Urus, which has a personalised number plate 'DE11 BOY', a homage to the character Del Boy Trotter from the classic TV show Only Fools and Horses.

Dawson started his career as a market trader, before founding The Range and scaling it to a major high street chain. He has since acquired Wilko and Homebase out of administration.

Chris Dawson, 74, runs CDS Superstores, which owns The Range, Homebase and Wilko

Poundstretcher owner Fortress is also understood to be looking at buying shops. The rival discount retailer runs more than 300 shops in the UK.

Supermarket Lidl also hopes to be able to snap up some of its stores if the retailer fails to sell the whole company. The discounter is pushing ahead with a major expansion mission.

TG Jones owner is also understood to be interested in buying parts of the Poundland business.

The private equity group owns Britain's WH Smith shops, now known as TG Jones stores and previously bought ailing accessories chain Claire's, Hobbycraft and The Original Factory Shop.

All Claire's standalone shops in the UK and Ireland stopped trading earlier this year after its financial woes saw it fall into administration twice in a year.

Are shops open and will staff be paid?

Poundland shops are currently open and operating business as usual.

But Poundland's managing director Barry Williams wrote a letter to around 12,000, accusing the retailer’s owner of limiting the chain's access to funding.

This has effectively prevented bosses from making routine payments, with suppliers now worried they will not be paid on time this week, according to Sky News.

But sources close to the crisis talks insisted that this should not prevent staff from being paid at the end of the month.

Williams told staff: 'I'm disappointed to have to tell you that Gordon Brothers have given instructions that restricts our access to funds that we would, in normal circumstances expect to access fully under our existing loan agreement.'

Gordon Brothers are accused of breaching the terms of an asset-based lending facility by failing to submit a budget to the shareholders on time despite an agreed grace period – with the business now outperforming those forecasts, Sky News reported.

Julie Palmer, managing partner at real estate advisory group BTG, says that in this situation, ‘existing commitments such as payroll and supplier invoices can still be met from cash already available‘.

But bosses cannot ‘draw further funds to cover anything beyond that,’ she says, which poses a problem as retailers typically draw from these loans in the autumn to buy Christmas stock - before repaying from festive sales in December and January.

She added: ‘If a lender has concerns about longer-term viability, it may simply be unwilling to increase its exposure by funding that stock build, particularly when it can’t be sure who will own the business, or what shape it will be in, by the time the money needs to come back.

‘That leaves management with very little room to manoeuvre. It limits their ability to buy stock or take on new commitments, and puts directors in a difficult position, because they must be confident the company can meet its liabilities before taking on new ones. Once credit insurers pull back and suppliers start asking for payment up front, the squeeze tightens quickly.’