Ahead of Wednesday’s budget, the Chancellor Rachel Reeves and Health Secretary Wes Streeting have confirmed they will be supporting the delivery of an extra two million NHS operations, scans and appointments a year to significantly cut waiting lists across England.
The Government says the funding will deliver an extra 40,000 elective appointments per week and includes an additional £1.8bn it has invested in elective activity this year since the July Statement.
This will be supported by a significant uplift of capital investment, with £1.5bn for new surgical hubs and scanners to increase capacity, meaning thousands of additional procedures and millions of diagnostic tests across the country, alongside £70m for new radiotherapy machines to improve cancer treatment.
The Government says that Wednesday’s budget will set out how it intends to establish the foundations to deliver change, by fixing the NHS and rebuilding Britain. It is promising to focus on “investment, investment, investment” to get the economy moving again and demonstrate how it will take the long-term decisions that are necessary to grow the economy and restore the country’s public services. It insists it will do this whilst ensuring working people don’t face higher taxes in their payslips, however, speculation continues to rumble around the definition of working people.
Rachel Reeves says: “Our NHS is the lifeblood of Britain. It exemplifies public services at their best, there for us when we need it and free at the point of use, for everyone in this country. That’s why I am putting an end to the neglect and underinvestment it has seen for over a decade now.
“We will be known as the Government that took the NHS from its worst crisis in its history, got it back on its feet again and made it fit for the bright future ahead of it.”
Change and reform
Building an NHS fit for the future is one of this Government’s five priority missions; but says it is clear that alongside sustainable investment, the NHS will need significant reform across the board to be truly transformed.
The Chancellor has therefore confirmed an ambitious reform programme across health and social care in England, including reforming the delivery of elective activity and patient pathways. Billions of pounds are set to be invested in technology and digital innovations across the NHS to boost productivity and unlock significant savings for the NHS in the long-term.
The funding comes after the Government last week launched ‘Change NHS: help build a health service fit for the future’, a national conversation to help develop the 10 Year Health Plan, which will set out its long-term vision for health and the path to delivering the three shifts to reform and transform health: hospital to community, analogue to digital, and sickness to prevention.
Starting this week, the NHS will help people back to health and back to work by sending teams of top clinicians to hospitals across the country to help roll out reforms to cut waiting lists in hospitals – which will start with those in areas of the highest economic inactivity.
