Rebuilding the NHS is the cornerstone of rebuilding Britain, the prime minister said, as he pledged to fight for the health service “day and night”.
Giving a speech at a hospital in Surrey on Monday, Sir Keir Starmer unveiled more detail about his plans for slashing NHS waiting lists, with the aim of slashing the number of people waiting longer than 18 weeks for treatment in England by nearly half a million over the next year.
Speaking with rolled up sleeves in front of a raft of frontline NHS workers and health secretary Wes Streeting, the prime minister promised to reform the health service from “top to bottom”.
He said 2025 “is about rebuilding Britain and rebuilding our NHS is the cornerstone of that”.
“We will, of course, protect the principles we all cherish – that you will work to every day – care free at the point of use, treatment according to need, key principles.
“But to catapult the service into the future, we need an NHS that is reformed from top to bottom, millions of extra appointments signed, sealed and delivered with the plan that we are launching here today: national renewal in action.”
Sir Keir said the NHS must be “hungry for innovation” but reiterated his belief that the health service cannot become a “national money pit”.
He said: “Working people can’t be expected to subsidise the current levels of care with ever-rising taxes. That is the price of ducking reform, and I won’t stand for it.
“I believe in public service. I believe in the NHS. I’ll fight for it day and night. I’ll never stand for that.”
Under his plans, Sir Keir said the NHS must deliver convenience for patients, just as people can book holidays and find love online.
“This plan that we’re launching today is a comprehensive level of that mindset, an NHS that treats patients more quickly, that is closer to their lives, gives them the level of convenience that they take for granted in nearly every other service they use every day,” he said.
“Just think about it – every day, just a few swipes of their phone, millions of people buy food or clothes for themselves and their family, they book holidays, they even find love.
“There is no reason, no good reason, why a public, free-at-the-point-of-use NHS can’t deliver that kind of convenience. In fact, it must.”
The prime minister pledged to put patients at the centre of their treatment and shift more care closer to the towns and cities where they live, something he said will make a “massive difference” to waiting times.
Meanwhile, allowing GPs to communicate directly with specialists to seek advice and diagnose people more quickly will save more than 800,000 unnecessary appointments and referrals every year.
Sir Keir told the medics who gathered to hear him speak that no institution is more important to the security of the country than the NHS.
He said: “Built by that generation eight decades ago now, it’s the embodiment of British values and humanities – fairness, equal respect.”
The PM also welcomed a new agreement to expand the relationship between the NHS and private healthcare sector in a bid to slash waiting times, saying the approach must be “totally unburdened by dogma”.
“Working people will expect nothing less”, the PM said. “So, today, I welcome a new agreement that will expand the relationship between the NHS and the private healthcare sector.
“Make the spaces, the facilities and resources of private hospitals more readily available to the NHS.
“That’s more beds, more operations, more care available to the NHS. Treating patients free at the point of use, targeted at where we need the most.”
