Well, I noticed it after the surgery. Our NHS saved our honourable Friend’s life. It is good to hear his personal story as well.
Health reconfiguration is crucial to ensure that our NHS is held to its highest standard. By the same token, these changes must be assessed to ensure that they benefit the future of the NHS. We want the correct funding. I hope that the Minister will reaffirm that he will encourage the Secretary of State to undertake discussions with his counterparts in the devolved institutions to weigh up how this will impact on other parts of the United Kingdom. People are waiting for life-saving cancer treatment, and people are waiting years for a consultation. Unfortunately, some of my constituents waited and did not get the surgery. They did not get their diagnosis early on and some of them are not here today. That is the reality of the waiting times that we all worry about.
The King’s Fund states that
“even under the most optimistic circumstances outlined in the NHS Five Year Forward View, an additional eight billion a year in funding was to be needed by 2020.”
We are already a year behind. If we want to protect and maintain our NHS, we must ensure that the correct funds are in place to secure its future in the United Kingdom. I urge the Minister to listen to NHS workers and focus on what they are telling us. The Minister needs to protect their jobs and livelihoods and the NHS.
3.28 pm