Local Labour MP, Nick Raynsford, has today condemned the hidden true cost of the Government’s wasteful NHS reorganisation in Greenwich. Nick was reacting to news unveiled by Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, Andy Burnham, that new Government-imposed guidelines force local Primary Care Trusts to put aside a percentage of their budget to pay for an ill-advised and unnecessary top-down overhaul of the NHS.

The new guidelines, published in the Government’s ‘Operating Framework’, will mean that NHS Greenwich is forced to ringfence 2% of its budget this year and next – costing over £18 million.

Nick says, ‘The NHS needs every penny it can get to pay for patient care. That the Government is forcing NHS Greenwich to hold back £18 million of its budget at a time when thousands of nursing jobs are being axed is nothing but a disgrace. I am disgusted by the Government’s reckless plans to force upon the NHS a costly restructure which no one needs, no one wants and no one voted for. It makes a total mockery of David Cameron’s general election pledge not to reorganise the NHS. His next airbrushed slogan should read ‘We will cut the NHS, not the deficit’.

The revelation of the Government’s plans come on top of news that waiting times are increasing since the Government scrapped Labour’s target of ensuring all patients are seen within 18 weeks. In Greenwich, the number of patients waiting more than 18 weeks for treatment has risen by a shocking 150 per cent since May 2010.

Nick added, ‘I would like to reassure my constituents that I remain wholly opposed to the Government’s Health and Social Care Bill. I urge everyone to sign up to Labour’s campaign at www.dropthebill.com. The time has come for David Cameron to listen, put the NHS first and drop his dangerous bill’.