White Paper Criticisms From The Centre Right

The Bow group, the oldest of the centre-right think tanks, have produced a report on the NHS white paper and they express concerns. In effect, they are saying that the NHS is a huge organisation and no one has ever made such large changes to such a large organisation and so the risks are high.

They say that Lansley is making wild claims about how much money he says he will save:

"the White Paper is not so clear on where precisely the pledged £20 billion will be saved and is even less clear on what constitutes the promised 45% cuts in “management costs”"

They go on about these wild claims even suggesting that the plans have no basis:

"Although we know that PCTs and SHAs are under “death sentence” and will soon be wiped off the NHS organogram, promises to “clear backroom staff”, “cut bureaucracy” and “make efficiency savings” confer a degree of vacuity that does raise important questions about how the theory will be mapped into practice."

Their conclusion is not encouraging:

"To put it bluntly, Andrew Lansley will either be remembered as the great reformer or the great failure."

My opinion is that if Lansley is allowed to go ahead with his plans, he will be known in the future as the Dr Beeching of the NHS. Their final statement is all too true, and rather chilling:

"After all, the NHS is just too important for failure to be an option."