Due to diary commitments in the constituency on Friday 11 March, I was unable to be in the House of Commons for the debate on the National Health Service Bill.
I believe that the proposed Bill would be an unnecessary upheaval and the wrong approach to improving the NHS. You may be interested to know that an authoritative comparative study of the performance of different national health systems recently concluded that the NHS is the best health service in the world.
There are now 1.3 million more operations being delivered each year compared to 2010, 10,700 more doctors and almost 11,800 more nurses. I am also proud that the Prime Minister has promised to increase investment in this Parliament with over £10 billion of additional NHS spending in real terms per annum by 2020/21. This will mean spending on the NHS will rise in every year in real-terms.
In my view, giving operational control for the day-to-day running of services to doctors was the right decision as they have the best understanding of their patients and local needs. Nonetheless the Government has always been clear that Ministers are responsible for the NHS, and it has performed well in challenging circumstances.
11.3.16
