NHS Reorganisation

We were doing what the manifesto said before the election. [Interruption.] We were doing it where the private sector and competition could add capacity to clear waiting lists, or do something new that the NHS was not doing. We did it in circumstances that were carefully planned, properly managed and always publicly accountable. If the hon. Gentleman is going to swallow the guff from those on his Front Bench that this is somehow an evolution of Labour's policy, he will have to ask the Health Secretary why he needs legislation that is more than three times longer than the Act that set up the NHS in the first place. Why do we say what we do in the motion before the House? In truth, this is a Tory reorganisation, and the legislation has been mis-sold. It is not just about getting GPs to lead commissioning or looking to cut layers of management; it is setting up the NHS as a full-scale market driven by the power of the competition regulator and the force of competition law. The reorganisation and legislation is designed to break up the NHS, to open up all areas of the NHS to private health companies, to remove requirements for proper openness, scrutiny and accountability to the public and to Parliament, and make the NHS subject to both UK and European competition law. The Tories are driving the free market political ideology through the heart of the NHS.