NHS Funding

Anna Soubry Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I think that the hon. Gentleman should withdraw that remark, because there was no reduction in health spending on my watch. I left plans for an increase, as I am about to explain. He illustrates the point that I am making: we are getting half-truths, spin and misrepresentation from Government Members on NHS spending. Indeed, we just got some more, and it is about time that we had a bit more accuracy in the House from them.

The story starts with the 2010 Conservative party manifesto. Let me quote from it:

“We will increase spending on health in real terms every year”.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Anna Soubry)]

Absolutely right.

[Andy Burnham]

Mr Dilnot may be watching; the Minister needs to be careful what she says.

That promise was carried into the coalition agreement, which said:

“We will guarantee”—

guarantee, mind—

“that health spending increases in real terms in each year of the Parliament”.

The Secretary of State has stopped nodding; he was nodding earlier. [Interruption.] I will be interested to hear how the Conservatives make those claims stack up, because week after week, Ministers from the Prime Minister downwards have stood at the Dispatch Box and claimed that that is exactly what they have delivered.

Until recently, this appeared prominently on the Conservative party website:

“We have increased the NHS budget in real terms in each of the last two years”.

Then, on 23 October, the Secretary of State said to the House:

“Real-terms spending on the NHS has increased across the country.”—[Official Report, 23 October 2012; Vol. 551, c. 815.]

[Interruption.] “It has”, he says again today. Okay, but this is where the story changes, because last week, he received a letter from the chair of the UK Statistics Authority, Andrew Dilnot CBE. Let me quote the key sentence, which puts Mr Dilnot and the Secretary of State at odds, if I heard the Secretary of State correctly a moment ago:

“On the basis of these figures, we would conclude that expenditure on the NHS in real terms was lower in 2011-12 than it was in 2009-10.”

[Interruption.] I am coming on to it all. In other words, NHS spending is lower, in real terms, after the first two years of the coalition, than when Labour left office.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Burnham]

I am coming to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello), because the context is that £1.6 billion, on the Government’s own figures, was spent on the back office, and taken away from the front line. The Chair of the Select Committee says that the cut was a little one, as though that is okay—“It’s really an increase, because it’s only a little cut”—but one has to add £1.6 billion to that to see the full extent of the diversion of funds from the NHS front line.

As the chair of the UK Statistics Authority has established, NHS spending was lower in the first two years of this coalition than when Labour left office. [Interruption.] The Secretary of State says that it is the same. Let us have some honesty here. Mr Dilnot says that it was a cut; accept what he says, and get on with the job. If the Secretary of State starts being a bit more honest at the Dispatch Box, he might get a bit more respect from the public.

The Prime Minister has cut the NHS—fact; but just as he airbrushed his poster, he has tried to airbrush the statistics, and he has been found out. To be fair, the Conservatives admitted it and corrected the Tory party website, but the problem is that we have a long list of similarly false claims made in the House that, as of now, stand uncorrected. Today, we invite the Secretary of State to correct the parliamentary record in person.

I am not surprised to see a few sheepish looks on the Conservative Benches, because we have been checking Conservative Members’ websites, and we found that the hon. Members for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous), for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin), and for Hendon (Dr Offord), the hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips), and the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire (Pauline Latham)—

[Anna Soubry]

They are sheep, are they?

[Andy Burnham]

They are certainly sheepish today; they need to get back to their offices pretty sharpish to amend their websites in light of the letter from the chair of the UK Statistics Authority.