Party Lines: October 6th

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

Andy Burnham has been front and centre of Labour’s response to the Tories today, commenting both on Cameron’s conference speech, as well as Andrew Lansley’s proposed restructing of the NHS.

After Cameron’s speech this afternoon, Burnham said that he had “failed to take responsibility” for decisions made since the Tories came to power:

“This was probably David Cameron’s most old fashioned party conference speech yet, packed with rat-a-tat lists that don’t stand up to scrutiny and some rather unconvincing attacks on Labour. David Cameron didn’t take responsibility for the decisions he has got wrong since taking office and tried to dismiss genuine concern about child benefit cuts with a single throw away line. The party faithful may be happy but meanwhile David Cameron seems intent on squeezing hardworking families and making them pay for his government’s cuts.”

Earlier today, Burnham spoke out on coalition plans to fundamentally alter the NHS, which he described as “rushed and ill thought through.”

“Labour warned the coalition that scrapping the 18 week maximum wait would mean waiting times rising again. Today we are seeing the first real evidence of that. “At the end of August, there were 2,100 more people waiting longer than 6 weeks for diagnostic tests than there were in the month the White Paper was published – an increase of 57% – and 1,900 more than the same month last year – an increase of 47%.”

“Removing national guarantees takes power away from the patient and hands it back to the system. In times of financial challenge, the system will manage that pressure by allowing waits to lengthen. We know that bottlenecks in diagnostics can prevent people from getting fast hospital treatment.

“This is just a taste of things to come, as patients pay the price for the Coalition’s rushed and ill thought through plans for the NHS.”

“The Government’s decision to scrap waiting guarantees for patients, and to remove the private patients cap, means we are seeing the return of the old Tory choice in health – wait longer or pay to go private.”

Burnham also wrote for LabourList today on the NHS reforms, and outlined how the Labour grassroots can fight back against the changes.