Labour's NHS overhaul: is 10-year plan just what the doctor ordered?

Keir Starmer today promised shorter waiting times, neighbourhood healthcare hubs and greater use of technology to move from an "analogue" NHS to a "truly digital health service".

But the NHS has been in a state of near-constant revolution for years as successive governments have tried to heal what former chancellor Nigel Lawson called "the closest thing the English people have to a religion". Will this 143-page, 10-year plan be yet another sticking plaster instead of a cure?

What did the commentators say?

"These ambitions have appeared in NHS plans for decades," said Jennifer Dixon, chief executive of the Health Foundation, a non-profit that works to improve health and care. The problem lies in "the relationship between the government and the NHS", said the Financial Times. "The wiring of the British state" is at fault, Dixon told the FT, due to the ongoing "churn" of ministers and civil servants. and policy "swerves".

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Of Health Secretary Wes Streeting's decision in March to scrap NHS England and take operational control back into the Department of Health and Social Care, Dixon told the FT: "If you want long-term policymaking, it's very difficult to square that with putting the leadership of the NHS back into the Department of Health. We haven't considered the right vehicle for this national asset."

Few argue against the plan to do more in community settings and less in hospitals, which have become overwhelmed in recent years. But there are risks to the proposed changes, including "staff shortages, tight public finances, a lack of premises in which to host one-stop-shop-style 'neighbourhood health services' and a public backlash at hospitals being downgraded", said The Guardian.

Dr Becks Fisher, director of research and policy at health think tank the Nuffield Trust, told BBC Radio 4's "World at One" that there are "lots of bold ambitions in this plan that we welcome". If they are delivered, they could be "game-changers". "Our big question is: Is this plan going to be deliverable?"

Ministers say the proposed "neighbourhood centres" will be staffed by doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other health professionals, as well as "specialists in debt advice and employment".

"The radical change would be delivering the vision," said Sarah Woolnough, chief executive of the King's Fund think tank. "History has shown us that you can't simply co-locate different health professionals in a building and expect a neighbourhood health service to flourish."

What next?

Just one in five Britons are satisfied with the NHS, the lowest since data was first collected in 1983 by the British Social Attitudes survey. But Julia Grace Patterson, CEO of Every Doctor, warned about the dangers of private sector involvement. "Starmer and Streeting will decide to partner heavily with the private sector to realise their plans, and I expect they'll try very hard to sell these ideas to the public," she told Big Issue. But "public-private partnerships have been a disaster for the NHS".

The stakes are high. Turning NHS England into a digital service is expected to cost £15 billion over five years and reforms to social care have been delayed until 2036 largely "because they are deemed unaffordable", said The Economist.

The NHS has lower administrative overheads than other systems and its centralisation of data could be key to reaping the potential benefits of AI. To leverage these strengths, Labour's plan must achieve the miracle cure of "reform without new money".