A hospital trust paid half a million pounds to consultants who recommended axing 325 jobs to save money.

The fees charged by PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC) and KPMG to turn around debt-ridden Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals Trust could have paid the annual salary of 30 nurses on a starting wage of £17,500.

The Argus has learned that the trust paid £367,300 to PWC for just two months work. The trust paid a further £150,000 for two months consultancy work by KPMG.

The consultants' advice will save the trust £10 million by the end of next year and £25 million overall but MPs and patients' groups questioned the need to bring in expensive advisers.

Paul Evans, director of the independent NHS Support Federation, based in Brighton, said: "The idea of spending a large amount of money like this on non-clinical issues is worrying.

"Such a focus is going to have an impact on patient care. Money should be spent on patients and keeping more staff instead of on consultants."

"My concern is that this is just the start and it is not just Brighton.

"More money is going to be spent by trusts on marketing and consultants, legal advice and accountancy as they compete with the private sector. Patients will be the ones to lose out."

Lewes MP Norman Baker said: "That is a lot of cash to spend on consultants, although they did not have much alternative because the Government said they had to. However, money spent on this sort of thing does not buy bandages."

He said consultants usually only told public bodies what they already knew.

The overall cost of the consultancy could be higher because it does not include the payments made to chief financial structuring officer Donald Muir, who has been appointed to see through the savings.

PWC was brought in after the trust was named by the Department of Health as one of the NHS organisations struggling to get out of debt.

A "turnaround team" of accountancy experts was sent to get the trust's finances in order, with the department contributing to the cost.

The trust brought in KPMG itself after its debts continued to spiral last year.

Brighton and Sussex needs to save £12 million this year and £25 million by 2008 to break even. It has an annual budget of about £300 million but is spending £1 million a month more than it can afford. Earlier this year it announced it was axing 325 posts as part of its turnaround plans.

Finance director David Dumigan agreed the cost was expensive but defended the move.

He said: "In the past we have been focusing on spending money on providing more of the same, instead of stepping back and looking critically at what we did.

"We were opening up more wards to deal with long lengths of stay and delayed discharges, and treating patients in hospital when they could have been more appropriately cared for elsewhere.

"We could not carry on spending money that we didn't have. The teams that came in have special skills in dealing with organisations in trouble. They have shown us how to make progress."

"We made best use of the time that they were here."

He added: "It is important to emphasise that our turnaround plan is not just about making savings - it's much broader than that.

"It is also looking at how we can work more efficiently, helping us to make savings in a sustainable way, ensuring a strong financial future for this trust as well as better patient care.

"The £517,300 is in line with investment made by other trusts who have also had turnaround teams."

Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs Crawley Hospital, revealed last month that it had paid out more than £700,000 to consultants.