In figures released under the Freedom of Information Act, the Royal Berkshire Hospital came top of a nationwide list of fees paid for agency nurses. The eye watering figure of £121.59 an hour was allegedly paid for an agency nurse by the Royal Berkshire trust in the last year.

A spokesman for the Royal Berkshire Hospital had said at the time: "We are unsure what the figure represents but it may well be that the sum was paid so that the agency nurse could afford to pay our car parking charges."

However, on further investigation, the trust has now said that it provided incorrect figures. "Time constraints led to an error in our figures as a full range of checks was not carried out. We are also looking at our previous claim of hitting a 98% Accident and Emergency target rate. It might actually have been 9.8%, but we have no way of verifying that."