Tories slam government over 'demoralised' NHS

Political expediency is driving cuts in training budgets and funding in the NHS leading to the "cruel irony" of experienced staff unable to find jobs, the Tories claimed today.

Shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley claimed in the Commons that the training budget across the NHS was going to be cut by 10% and that surgeons and specialists with vast experience were not able to find work.

During an opposition debate, Mr Lansley ridiculed Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt for her claim that the NHS had seen its "best year ever".

And in noisy scenes in the Commons, he told how staff were "demoralised" and attacked Ms Hewitt over what he claimed were meetings she chaired to decide hospital closures while Labour Party officials were present.

Mr Lansley said: "I believe in the NHS, I believe in what the staff of the NHS can achieve, but only if we give them the framework, the resources and the freedom to deliver. That is our objective."

But Ms Hewitt brushed aside the criticisms saying that Mr Lansley had only concentrated on what he claimed was wrong with the NHS.

She said: "I want to start by congratulating the staff of the NHS." The 1.3 million staff were "committed and dedicated" and many of them were working in "very difficult circumstances".

Mr Lansley claimed that many graduates across the NHS were unable to find jobs and that training posts were being reduced, which he blamed on the deficits in NHS trusts.

He said: "The impact of deficits is impacting directly on existing specialists."

Mr Lansley claimed that by December this year, 61 cardio-thoracic surgeons would not have appointments as consultants, 37 holders of specialist training would not have posts in ear, nose and throat departments and the numbers of consultant anaesthetists were falling and there were fewer jobs being advertised.

He challenged Ms Hewitt over cuts to the training budget. "You might like to tell us whether it is indeed the case that training budgets across the country are going to be cut by 10% this year."

Mr Lansley raised the issue of meetings that Ms Hewitt had with Labour party chairwoman Hazel Blears when discussing hospital closures.

He said: "What does it look like on July 3 when you sat down with the chairman of the Labour Party and ministers and political advisors including staff from the Labour Party in order to debate their heat maps to decide where hospitals were going to be shut across the country.

"It's not acceptable. It is the game of political football that the Government are pursuing and not us."

Mr Lansley concluded: "The staff of the NHS are our greatest asset. They work miracles daily, we need them to be motivated and inspired. At the moment they are demoralised.

"The Secretary of State has gone from 'Best year ever' in May to 'A very difficult year' when she got to September.

"The NHS staff are seeing a feast turning into a famine, promises of expansion turned to cutbacks, they see ad campaigns three or four years ago to recruit new nurses and therapists turning into a cruel irony of people leaving training unable to find jobs, unable to pursue their consultations over service reconfigurations driven by short term financial expedience...dressed up as if services have to be shut down because they are unsafe.

"People across this country are working to save the NHS."

Ms Hewitt faced repeated interruptions from Tory backbenchers worried about local health reorganisation as she sought to defend the changes.

She said there were real challenges in trying to ensure the enormous amount of extra money going into the NHS was used to best possible effect.

And she condemned the Tories' own NHS policy as a "mish mash of confusion and contradiction".

Ms Hewitt said the Conservatives pretended to promise a "blank cheque" for the NHS - yet they were the party that had "starved" the service of funds when last in power.

She said it was wrong for a minority of hospitals to continue to overspend at the expense of the majority which were in balance or surplus.

Promising to support any member of staff who lost their job, under reorganisation, she said: "It's essential that hospitals continue to become more effective in the use of resources, so we can free money to pay for the extra treatments and drugs.

"The more the British people hear from the Conservatives, the more they see the contradictions, the confusion, the intellectual dishonesty - the more they realise that try as they might you can't take the Con out of Conservative."

Copyright Press Association 2006