16.06.11
Milburn angered by NHS ‘car crash’
A former Labour health secretary has criticised the Coalition’s NHS reforms as the ‘biggest car crash’ in the service’s history.
Alan Milburn, who served under Tony Blair, and is widely seen as a moderniser, made his comments as the Government sought to explain the new NHS proposals following the conclusion of the self-imposed ‘listening exercise’.
Prime Minister David Cameron has insisted the changes to Health Secretary Andrew Lansley’s (pictured) reforms does not constitute a U-turn, whilst Deputy PM, Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg, has championed a series of alterations he wanted in the final Bill.
Milburn, who now advises the Government on social mobility, told the Telegraph newspaper: "The Government's health reforms are the biggest car crash in NHS history.
"The temptation to elevate short-term politics above long-term policy proved too much for both David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Many in both camps inside the coalition consider the U-turn a triumph. But it has the makings of a policy disaster for the NHS and, maybe in time, a political disaster for the Government.
"It leaves both health policy and British politics in a very different place."
He added: "The promise of the coalition was that it would go where New Labour feared to tread when it came to public service reform. There would be no no-go areas.
"In fact David Cameron's retreat has taken his party to a far less reformist and more protectionist position than that adopted by Tony Blair and even that of his predecessor Gordon Brown."
Mr Milburn described the new policy as the "biggest nationalisation since Nye Bevan created the NHS in 1948" and said overall control had been handed to a body - the NHS Commissioning Board - which he described as "the daddy of all quangos".
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