Drop ‘dangerous and damaging’ private finance plans for NHS, Chancellor warned
Chancellor Rachel Reeves delivers a speech in the media briefing room of 9 Downing Street in central London, ahead of the Budget later this month, November 4, 2025ACADEMICS and campaigners have called on Chancellor Rachel Reeves to drop “dangerous and damaging” NHS private finance plans ahead of the autumn Budget next week.
The government is considering new PFI-style deals to build “neighbourhood health centres” under plans to move care from hospitals into community settings.
In their 10-year NHS plan, ministers set out the possibility of relying on public-private partnerships (PPP) to fund the centres, fuelling concerns that taxpayers could be left footing the bill for high borrowing costs.
Campaigners gathered outside the Department of Health and Social Care yesterday in a protest organised by We Own It to demand a halt to the plans.
The anti-privatisation group has also co-ordinated a letter, signed by 50 academics, which calls on Ms Reeves to “abandon this dangerous and damaging proposal and fund public services through direct taxation or borrowing.”
Signed by figures such as Lord Sikka, the letter calls the arguments for private finance “bogus” and warns Ms Reeves that “using private capital in the NHS is no different from a family buying their home using a payday loan.”
Campaigners have warned about the dangers of risking a repeat of disastrous PFI (private finance initiative) schemes, in which private firms funded the building of hospitals, while high-interest repayments were made over the long term.
Research by the Institute for Public Policy Research found that for just £13 billion of investment, the NHS was landed with an £80bn bill.
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Continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/drop-dangerous-and-damaging-private-finance-plans-nhs-chancellor-warned
Corridor care ‘new normal’ in England for one in five NHS inpatients
Findings of CQC survey from November 2024 lead experts to say waiting in such settings has become normalised
Corridor care has become the new normal in England, experts have said, as a national survey found that one in five patients admitted to hospital had to wait in such settings.
The report by the Care Quality Commission also found that nearly 10% of patients waited more than 24 hours to be admitted to hospital and 17.5% waited 12 to 24 hours.More than half of all patients waited more than six hours.
Nearly half waited in a treatment bay, but 18% had to wait in a corridor, 31% in a waiting room and 1%, or 361 patients, said they had to wait in a storage room or cupboard in November last year.
The CQC’s chief inspector of hospitals, Dr Toli Onon, said trolley waits were regrettable and must not become the norm. She said it was great to see improvements since but that reports of lengthy waits and patients whose health had deteriorated was a real concern.
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Article continues at https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/sep/09/one-in-five-inpatients-hospital-corridors-england-cqc-survey
Wes Streeting accused of ‘chaotic and incoherent approach’ to NHS reform
Exclusive: thinktank report finds health secretary has failed to improve productivity and the health service is unlikely to meet its targets
Wes Streeting has been accused of taking a “chaotic and incoherent approach” to reforming the NHS, which makes it unlikely the government will hit its own targets, according to a damning report by the Institute for Government (IfG).
The report praises elements of how the health secretary has managed the health service in his first year in office, including improving performance and staff retention in hospitals. The pay settlement he reached with resident doctors last year avoided a winter plagued by NHS strikes
But it also criticises significant aspects of his performance, including the way he handled the abolition of NHS England and his lack of action to stem the exodus of senior GPs.
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Stuart Hoddinott, the IfG’s associate director and the author of the report, said: “There have been some positive steps: performance is trending slowly upwards in hospitals, there’s been a genuinely large increase in GPs and the rate at which hospital staff are leaving their jobs is the lowest on record outside the pandemic.
“But that has been undermined by a chaotic and incoherent approach to reforming the service. The announcement of NHS England’s abolition was abysmally handled and management cuts in integrated care boards have been a needless distraction.”
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Original article at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/nov/15/wes-streeting-accused-of-chaotic-and-incoherent-approach-to-nhs-reform
Wes Streeting berates doctor live on-air as five-day BMA strike begins
Junior doctors and members of the British Medical Association (BMA) on the picket line outside Cheltenham General Hospital during their continuing dispute over pay, January 8, 2024HEALTH SECRETARY Wes Streeting ranted on live radio today as thousands of resident doctors began their five-day strike in England.
He unleashed a tirade on LBC after north London doctor Niraj told him that “we all care about patient safety, none of us wants to be on strike, I would rather be at work today.”
The British Medical Association (BMA) called the 13th strike by doctors since March 2023, having long called for their pay to be restored to pre-austerity rates.
Despite rises by Labour, it remains about a fifth down on its real-terms value in 2008.
Mr Streeting clashed angrily after Niraj raised his union’s concerns over a lack of training places and other workforce issues.
He accused doctors of “inflicting pain and misery” on patients and holding them to ransom by its “extremely irresponsible” action.
The Health Secretary claimed the “extremely unnecessary” strikes were shocking given patients receive “a substandard service” and that the BMA was speaking for its “activists” rather than their members.
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Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/wes-streeting-berates-doctor-live-air-five-day-bma-strike-begins