Jim Easton, who has been NHS National Director of Improvement and Efficiency since 2009, has resigned to take up a pricing position at Care UK. In his role in the NHS, Easton oversaw the QIPP Agenda (Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention) – the large-scale transformational programme for the NHS that seeks to improve the quality of care the NHS delivers while making up to £20billion of efficiency savings by 2014-15, which will be reinvested in frontline care. Easton has recently criticised certain people within the NHS for cutting costs but without introducing new efficiencies.