‘More Waste, Cost, Bureaucracy and Complexity’ – Wigan MP Lisa Nandy Pledges to Vote Against the Health and Social Care Bill

This week the House of Commons will debate the Coalition Government’s wasteful and bureaucratic reorganisation plans for the NHS, which local MP Lisa Nandy has said will get in the way of patient care.

David Cameron has broken his promises on the NHS:

• He promised no top-down reorganisations but is pushing through the biggest reorganisation in the history of the NHS.
• He promised real terms increases every year of this Parliament, but he cut the NHS by £150m last year.
• He promised to protect the NHS, but over 400,000 more people have suffered long waits for treatment and tests since the election.

The essential elements of the Tories’ long terms plans are to set the NHS up as a full scale market, based on the model of the privatised utilities. A new economic regulator will enforce competition law on the NHS for the first time, and have the power to fine hospitals 10% of their turnover for working together.

The Bill removes a key protection of the 1946 Act that set up the NHS – that the Secretary of State for Health is directly accountable for providing the health service. The Government’s plans will break up the NHS as a national public service so that patients will increasingly see the services on which they depend subject to the lottery of where they live.