I make no apologies for returning to my concerns about what
the Government is doing to our NHS.
After David Cameron promised ‘no top-down re-organisation
of the NHS” and Nick Clegg promised a “bonfire of the quangos”, we
now find ourselves in the biggest top-down re-organisation the NHS has ever
seen and the creation of new quangos, whose spending powers swamp all the other
quangos put together.
Meanwhile, waiting-times for treatment are continuing to
rise, month-by-month. This government inherited a decade of falling
waiting-times, year-on-year. Since Cameron, Clegg and Lansley took control they
have shot up.
Between May 2010 and March 2012, the number of patients who
have waited more than 18 weeks for admission to hospital have shot up by 68% in
Sheffield, 78% in Rotherham, 21% in Barnsley, 61% in Doncaster and 141% in
Derbyshire.
Now, the government has announced a new funding formula in
the way it distributes money to address health inequalities. You will not be
surprised that, rather like the new funding formulae for local government, the
outcome is that funds are being massively transferred from the poorest areas in
the country – those with the greatest health needs – to the wealthiest areas.
The scale of the cuts is dramatic. Sheffield will lose
nearly £73m a year; Rotherham will lose more than £64m; Barnsley will lose
nearly £90m; Doncaster will lose more than £78m, and Derbyshire will lose
nearly £40m.
Meanwhile, Surrey will gain more than £400m; Hampshire will
gain more than £322m and Oxfordshire – partly represented in parliament by
David Cameron – will gain nearly £174m.
As with the budget announcement on taxes, this government
has turned “to him that hath shall be given, and he that hath not, from him
shall be taken even that which he hath” into a mantra to be implemented.
We’re all in it together? You must be joking.
