Shropshire Star

Letter: MP's comments on NHS need a response

I really cannot let Owen Paterson's statement that "the NHS is no longer the world leader" go without response.

Published
Owen Paterson

The NHS is clearly struggling and there are a number of reasons for this, I am listing some of the most significant:

1. The introduction by Ken Clarke of the purchaser-provider split whereby one part of the NHS bought services from... another part of the NHS – this, of course, laid the initial foundations for the introduction of significant private contracting.

2. The use of Treasury driven Private Finance Initiative schemes used by both Labour and Conservative governments to enable new build schemes while landing the NHS with a future crippling burden.

3. The devastating re-structuring of the NHS by Andrew Lansley, now recognised by most commentators to have been an expensive disaster.

4. The failure by successive governments to recognise the need to maintain and extend medical and nurse training as well as the appalling decision by the current government to annihilate nurse training support, presumably on the basis that we can always recruit nurses from elsewhere.

5. The current government policy to decimate local authority funding with the knock on effect of struggling social care services and the impact on hospitals in the name of austerity.

6. The continued underfunding of the NHS – two years ago there was general agreement by all major experts, including the government's own leader of the NHS that an additional £30 billion would be needed for the NHS by 2020 in order that services could simply stand still.

In fact, despite ministerial statements that the NHS is being protected financially, the £30 billion has been cut to less than £10 billion and if you look in detail at the figures, the real input is more like £8 billion – keeping the UK on a par in relation to percentage of GDP spending on health with Iceland and Slovenia and behind every other European country despite apparently being wealthier than all but Germany.

There are a number of other issues I could raise but the above are some of the most important ones – it is to the politicians we must look to put right the errors that politicians have made over many years.

Yes Owen, you may be right about the NHS having slipped despite the tremendous commitment of its doctors, nurses, paramedics, managers and other staff but you need to acknowledge why that is and where the responsibility lies.

Dag Saunders, Sutton Hill

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