ConDem government scraps NHS waiting time targets
The new Conservative / Liberal Democrat (ConDem) government has scrapped Labour’s waiting time targets in a bid to reduce the country’s debt.
With redundancies and recruitment freezes and the cancellation of targets such as patients being seen by a GP within 48 hours and hospitals seeing patients within 18 weeks of referrals, the government aims to reduce the amount being spent on the NHS each year without making any budgetary cuts.
The NHS and Pensions are the two largest areas of government spending. The NHS budget alone rose to £121 billion last year, which totalled an increase of £81 billion since 1997, in line with inflation.
For every 10 per cent cut from the NHS, £12 billion is added to the UK’s annual savings but ConDem has stated they will not reduce NHS annual budgets, just waiting time targets, in the hope that this will deliver greater competition between surgeries and hospitals.
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