Andrew Lansley is Shadow Secretary of State for Health and here he writes exclusively for ConservativeHome about the party's newly-stated priorities for the NHS and defends the pledge to increase NHS spending.
Yesterday morning, David Cameron set out a future Conservative Government’s five priorities for NHS reform. With the public increasingly indicating that they trust Conservatives with the future of the NHS, and professionals consistently expressing confidence in Conservative policies, people are eager to know what a Conservative NHS will look like.
We welcome any opportunity to set out our vision for the NHS. Rarely has a week gone by in the past five years where my colleagues in the Shadow Health team and I have not travelled up, down and cross country to visit hospitals, GP surgeries and dentists, to hear from those who serve in the NHS on the ground. Back in Westminster, we have sat through four Secretaries of State trying to dictate to clinicians from Whitehall. We have witnessed the deleterious effects on professional morale and patient care.
Through this journey, we have developed a plan for change that puts patients in the driving seat and liberates professionals to focus on patients’ priorities. We are determined not to make the mistake at the heart of Labour’s failure. They had a plan to win the election – but they had no plan for delivery. For Blair and Brown, the election was solely about getting into office, and their approach to office was simply about winning the next election. In fact, the man who was head of the Government’s strategy for three years at the Department of Health, Professor Chris Ham, recently admitted there had been no strategy:
"When Blair's government was elected, it had no clear idea what it wanted to do with the NHS."
The time is approaching when we will ask the public to put their trust in us at the ballot box. We are determined to live up to that trust by being ready to govern, and to deliver on our promises. That’s why we will always tackle head on any questions over our policy proposals. I know that there has been robust discussion here on ConservativeHome over our pledge to increase NHS spending at a time of crisis in our public finances.
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