Theresa May is today defending her claim that a Brexit dividend can help boost the NHS as she unveils a £25billion cash injection.
The Prime Minister will say the health service is the government’s ‘number one priority’ as she delivers a keynote speech.
Mrs May will point to her own experience of suffering from diabetes – saying she would never have made it to Downing Street without help from the NHS.
Brexiteers including Boris Johnson have hailed the move as a ‘downpayment’ on the funds sent to Brussels.
But the premier’s insistence that money reclaimed from the EU can help prop up services has been dismissed as ‘tosh’ by some of her own MPs.
She is also facing a backlash at the prospect of deploying ‘stealth taxes’ to drum up more revenue for the Treasury.
Theresa May, pictured on the BBC’ Andrew Marr show yesterday, announced a £25billion-a-year boost for the National Health Service
The funding boost will still mean growth in NHS budgets is lower in real terms than under the Blair and Brown governments
Ms Wollaston said talk that a Brexit dividend will fund the NHS uplift is nonsense
The Prime Minister announced yesterday plans to invest an extra £25billion into the NHS’s annual budget by 2023.
Spending on NHS England will rise £20billion a year, while the Scottish government will be given an extra £2billion and Wales will receive £1.2billion – along with hundreds of millions for the health service in Northern Ireland.
In a surprise additional boost, a further £1.25billion will be allocated each year to relieve NHS pension deficits.
Mrs May also said a chunk of the money would be coming from a so-called ‘Brexit dividend’ – a claim rubbished by one of her politicians.
The PM is gathering Cabinet this morning to discuss the plans before making her long-awaited speech – which marks the 70th birthday of the NHS.
In her address, she will point to her own reliance on the NHS after she was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes.
‘I would not be doing the job I am doing today without that support,’ she will say.
In return for the extra funding, Mrs May will ask the NHS to produce a ten-year plan later this year that includes significantly improving access to good mental health services and cutting waste.
She will warn there cannot be a repeat of the increases in NHS spending under New Labour, when she said nearly as much as half of the money failed to get to frontline staff to improve patient care.
She will say: ‘This must be a plan that ensures every penny is well spent. It must be a plan that tackles waste, reduces bureaucracy and eliminates unacceptable variation, with all these efficiency savings reinvested back into patient care.
‘It must be a plan that makes better use of capital investment to modernise its buildings and invest in technology to drive productivity improvements. It must be a plan that enjoys the support of NHS staff across the country – not something dreamt up in Whitehall and centrally imposed.’
There have been high-profile examples of NHS waste in recent years. For instance, one hospital was found to be spending £16.47 on a pack of 12 rubber gloves, while another spent 35p. On toilet roll, some hospitals pay 67p per roll, others pay just 34p.
An estimated £1billion a year is wasted because patients are not showing up for hospital appointments, £26million a year is spent on prescriptions for gluten-free food even though it can be bought from supermarkets, and £1.5billion a year is spent on agency nurses.
Interviewed on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show yesterday, Mrs May said ‘as a member of the European Union, every year we spend significant amounts of money on our subscription, if you like, to the EU’.
She added: ‘When we leave we won’t be doing that. It’s right that we use that money to spend on our priorities, and the NHS is our number-one priority.’
But Dr Sarah Wollaston, who chairs the Commons health and social care committee, criticised her party leader for bucking to ‘populist arguments’.
She tweeted: ‘The Brexit dividend tosh was expected but treats the public as fools.
‘(I’m) sad to see (the) government slide to populist arguments rather than evidence on such an important issue.
‘This will make it harder to have a rational debate about the ‘who and how’ of funding and sharing this fairly’.
An estimated £1billion a year is wasted because patients are not showing up for hospital appointments while £26million a year is spent on prescriptions for gluten-free food
Philip Hammond (pictured in Downing Street last week) sat down on Friday and drew up plans with Mrs May and Jeremy Hunt
Theresa May (pictured on her way to church yesterday with husband Philip in Maidenhead) has come under huge pressure to find extra money for the NHS amid warnings the service is at breaking point with waiting times spiraling and operations cancelled.
The deal was decided on Friday afternoon between Mrs May, health secretary Jeremy Hunt, Chancellor Philip Hammond and the chief executive of NHS England Simon Stevens.
Mr Hunt admitted today that the negotiations within government had ‘gone to the wire’ – and there appears to have been only broad agreement on where the money will come from.
A source told The Times: ‘By the end of the meeting, some sources of funding had been more heavily pencilled in than others.’
Plans to raise money from freezing all personal allowance and national insurance thresholds at the end of the parliament could raise nearly £4 billion.
Borrowing could account for £8billion to £10billion.
Senior Tory MP brands the Brexit dividend money ‘tosh’
Dr Sarah Wollaston rubbished Theresa May’s claims that money the UK saves from not being in the EU will help beef up its ailing hospitals (file pic)
A senior Tory MP branded the Brexit dividend ‘tosh’ as she warned the PM’s cash boost for the NHS will still leave services short.
Dr Sarah Wollaston, who was a GP and is now chairwoman of the health select committee, rubbished Theresa May’s claims that money the UK saves from not being in the EU will help beef up its ailing hospitals.
She said the Government is treating the British public ‘like fools’ in making the claim.
It comes as Mrs May was unable to spell out exactly how much of the £20billion cash injection will come from the Brexit dividend.
Dr Wollaston tweeted: ‘The Brexit dividend tosh was expected but treats the public as fools.
‘Sad to see Govt slide to populist arguments rather than evidence on such an important issue.
‘This will make it harder to have a rational debate about the ‘who & how’ of funding & sharing this fairly.’
But there is significant resistance to plans to defer corporation tax rate cuts, which could free up another £6billion,for the government.
That is thought to leave a potential £11billion black hole where the source of the funding is unclear.
Economist Paul Johnson, of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, dismissed Mrs May’s claim about a Brexit dividend, saying this would be wiped out by slower growth and lower tax revenues.
He said the so-called windfall from EU withdrawal would not materialise when the UK stopped paying more than £9 billion a year to Brussels due to the ‘divorce bill’ of some £39 billion, and other economic factors.
Labour, which said it would match the Tory funding proposals if in power, called on Mrs May to set out details of how her plan would be paid for.
Mrs May is using her speech in London to say the NHS has a special place in British life, stating: ‘I will never forget visiting the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital in the aftermath of the Manchester Arena attack. There, in the face of the very worst that humanity can do, I witnessed first-hand, the very best.
‘Doctors and nurses working 24-hour shifts to treat the injured. Surgeons who were off-shift, dropping everything to come in and perform life-saving operations.
‘Paramedics who had risked their own lives to get others to safety. In every instance, I was struck not only by the medical expertise of the staff, but the compassion with which people were treated. This is our National Health Service.’