FYI

Press Release Below from the Department of Health in England

http://www.dh.gov.uk/PublicationsAndStatistics/PressReleases/PressReleasesNotices/fs/en?CONTENT_ID=4124485&chk=WdN7Z5

The full text of the Minister's speech which was the Annual LSE Health and Social Care lecture is available at

http://www.dh.gov.uk/NewsHome/Speeches/SpeechesList/SpeechesArticle/fs/en?CONTENT_ID=4124484&chk=Pf%2Bt%2Br

Best wishes

David McDaid
LSE Health and Social Care

Published: 
Tuesday 13 December 2005 
Reference number: 
2005/0445 
Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt today set out the two-year programme for the next stages of NHS reform.
She said that Government was committed to pressing ahead with root and branch reform in order to create a modern, self-improving, value-for-money NHS that better met the needs of both patients and taxpayers.
She announced that:
*	financial reforms would continue to tackle deficits and ensure better value for money; 
*	fairer funding would go to deprived areas, enabling GPs in the areas of the greatest health inequalities commission services to improve health outcomes and reduce inequalities in these areas; and 
*	continued use would be made of the independent sector to achieve waiting list reductions. 
Patricia Hewitt said:
"The next 24 months will determine what kind of NHS we will have for the next 20 years.
"The NHS has been through a first phase transformation. Phase one was about driving up standards. Waiting lists are the lowest since records began, deaths from the big killer diseases are falling, we have transformed A&E services and we have more new hospitals.
"But whilst some parts of the NHS are world-beaters, the NHS as a whole is not. It still fails too many people, especially the poorest, most vulnerable and most in need. That's why we need a second stage transformation, giving patients better service as well as better value for money. 
"We can't achieve these goals through national targets and command and control. We need to ensure that the system itself has the right incentives for continuous improvement and better value for money embedded into it."
On the issue of financial reform she said:
"More money than ever is going into the NHS. But we need to ensure that we're getting efficiency and value for money for every extra penny.
"The system of the past, with hospitals given an annual block grant, was completely inefficient. There was no incentive to improve. If you failed to balance the books you got bailed out and if you ran up a surplus it got taken from you.
"The transition to payment by results - where hospitals will get paid for every item of work they do - will radically change this. As money follows the patient, poor performance will be obvious and hospitals will have real incentives to improve.
"Reform is the solution, not the problem. Reform serves to highlight financial deficits so we can locate the problem and fix it. The failure of a minority of organisations to live within the resources available at a time when funding growth is at historic levels underlines the importance of reform.
"Waste and inefficiency in the NHS is intolerable. A penny wasted is a penny stolen from a patient. I want NHS staff to help me root out examples of waste and work together to stop them by shining a light on examples of inefficiency."
She said the Government would not backtrack from wholesale reform, because it would mean greater choice for patients, with more providers of care.
"We need to march on with reform because society, economy and the world keeps on changing and the NHS needs to change with it. If we are to convince the public to keep supporting a tax-funded system, free at the point of need, then the NHS has to provide not just a greater quantity of healthcare but greater quality too.
"We still spend too much on dealing with people who are sick compared to helping people stay fit and healthy. We need a patient-led NHS with more choice and a stronger voice for patients and users.
"Every patient will, by 1 January, be offered a choice of at least four hospitals, with the range of choices built up through next year until 2008 when every patient will be able to choose from any hospital.
"We need to offer more choice after diagnosis as well as at referral. We want to build on the direct payments and individual budgets that are starting to give people far more choice over their care.
"GPs will also be more accountable for taxpayers' money through practice-based commissioning. Every GP will have an indicative budget from their Primary Care Trust (PCT) to pull services into the community where they are most convenient for patients and provide better value for money.
"Stronger PCTs will ensure the right service provision and balance exists. GPs who manage their budgets well will have more freedom to innovate and invest and those that don't will be held to account by their PCT.
"We will also over time move GPs from budgets based on historic activity to budgets based on fair shares, again tackling the injustice that has too often seen communities with the greatest health needs receive the worst health services.
"I know that the second wave of independent sector procurement is also controversial, but I also know that the only way to achieve the 18 week target will be to achieve an enormous increase in diagnostic capacity both in the NHS and independent sector. We won't abolish waiting lists without it."
Ms Hewitt also launched the publication of Reform of the NHS in England: Update and Next Steps, a handbook for the local NHS on how to deliver the reforms. 
It sets out the framework for the reforms of the NHS. It is the first in a series of publications building on the commitment in Creating a Patient-led NHS to explain how the whole reform programme fits together. While many of the policies and initiatives in the document are well known, it explains how the reforms are mutually reinforcing and sets out a programme of further work for 2006/07.
Patricia Hewitt concluded:
"If we stick to our course of investment and reform, the NHS will provide better
Patricia Hewitt was giving the London School of Economics Annual Health and Social Care Lecture entitled Investment and Reform: Transforming Health and Healthcare.
2. Reform of the NHS in England: Update and Next Steps is available at www.dh.gov.uk/publications