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Health Minister Ashley Dalton says Brits are suffering from a decade and a half of underinvestment in the NHS – with patients enduring broken lifts, burst pipes and power failures
Our NHS hospitals have been left in an appalling condition.
A decade and a half of underinvestment means patients and staff are working and being treated in dilapidated old buildings that are barely fit for purpose, let alone a modern health service.
Every Mirror reader will have seen and experienced the dire state of the infrastructure we inherited.
Broken lifts, outdated flooring and bad lighting cause uncomfortable conditions. But worse are the burst pipes, power failures and broken heaters that cause the cancellation of vital appointments and operations.
Since taking office, we have invested record amounts, totally £26 billion, to rebuild and renew the NHS through the government’s Plan for Change.
First things first, our hospitals require urgent maintenance to tackle issues plaguing sites up and down the country. This is about freeing up staff time, allowing them to work to the top of their abilities, and keeping patients safe.
These fixes are needed now. That’s why today we’ve allocated £750million to hospitals up and down the country to make the urgent repairs they need.
Patients will see and feel the difference. It means things like improved lifts, so patients can be transferred safely around hospital buildings.
It means upgraded ventilation in neo-natal emergency units, giving new babies receiving critical care and new parents more comfortable conditions.
And it means reliable electrics and plumbing, allowing surgeries, treatments and important consultations to go ahead without interruption, improving productivity across the health service.
This is just one element of our mission to improve standards and cut waiting times right across the NHS through our Plan for Change.
Today’s announcement comes alongside £470million to make vital improvements to hundreds of schools right across the country – showing we’re taking a cross-government approach to making improvements.
And in health, these vital repairs are just the start. We’re following through on our promise to deliver better care, closer to home by shifting services from hospitals into the community, including offering more at pharmacies and increasing opening hours at community diagnostic centres.
We’re utilising technology by expanding the NHS App to save thousands of clinical hours, and rolling out cutting-edge radiotherapy machines to give cancer patients better and safer treatment.
The challenge we have to turn around the state our health service was left in is big.
But by taking care of the urgent repairs needed in hospitals all over the country, we are proving that no detail is too small.