Murnaghan 22.06.14 Interview with Andy Burnham, MP, Shadow Health Secretary

ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO MURNAGHAN, SKY NEWS

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now the Health Minister, Jane Ellison, is at the centre of controversy this weekend after she was recorded chuckling as she said the government had given away political control of the National Health Service.  Sky News has obtained a tape and here’s Jane Ellison telling the Conservative Reform Group that providing political direction to the NHS is like being on a high wire without a safety net.  This is some of what she said.

JANE ELLISON: "I don't know how much any of you realise that with the Lansley act we pretty much gave away control of the NHS, which means that the thing that most people talk about in terms of health, the NHS, we have some important strategic mechanisms but we don't really have day-to-day control.  From a political point of view, it is a bit like being on a high wire without a net at times".

DM: I am joined now from Leigh in Lancashire by the Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham, a very good morning to you Mr Burnham.  Is that really that outrageous, I mean do we want politicians to be in day to day control of the NHS? 

ANDY BURNHAM: Well Dermot I think you’ll remember me coming on your programme many times when the Bill was going through parliament and the reorganisation was coming, getting very angry about it and I think people now will understand why I was so angry about it.  We have a Health Minister here, laughing on tape about giving away control of the NHS without the public noticing.  Well to be honest, for millions of patients in this country it is no laughing matter.  We have got NHS waiting lists at a six year high, A&E in a summer crisis now and the finances going down the pan.  This is the moment when the government should be doing something about all of those things but now we know why they can’t do anything, because as they say they just handed away control.  The NHS deserves a lot better than this current government. 

DM: But it’s about the control, the day to day control she was talking about and I remember you coming on this programme many times and telling me patients have to have more say, clinicians have to have more say. Well they got it in those reforms. 

ANDY BURNHAM: You can do that though, can’t you, without giving away the whole thing.  When waiting lists are coming up to a six year high, when you have the cancer target being breached for the first time ever, the public will say to people like me, well do something about it, that’s not good enough, people are suffering here but obviously this current government can’t do anything about it because they turned the NHS into the biggest quango in the world.  As I say, who gave them permission to do that, Dermot?  Who voted for this change?  The answer is nobody gave them permission to do this to our National Health Service and that is the point.  It is not about politicians meddling all the time, it is about proper democratic accountability for what happens in a public service that spends more than £100 billion of tax payers money and I am saying you today on this programme, that is why I will repeal the Bill that does this and I will restore democratic control and accountability to our NHS.

DM: Is it democratic control to have the great I am, if it’s you that’s the Health Secretary, sitting there in Whitehall dictating what happens in Trusts up and down the country?  Isn’t it democratic control if these powers are devolved?

ANDY BURNHAM: That’s not fair, is it, because we did devolve power when we were in government, creating Foundation Trusts.  The whole idea of Foundation Trusts was to put more power in the hands of local communities to be able to shape their hospital services so it’s a balance but my point is, at the end of the day when things aren’t going right, when A&E are not seeing people within four hours, when people waiting for cancer treatment to start are saying that it can’t start because there are no appointments, those people need answers don’t they and they look to elected politicians to get a grip on things and that is what the current government can’t do.  If you write to them, they say this is a matter for NHS England but I just don’t think the public expect that.  They are responsible for £100 billion worth of their money and they expect Ministers to sort things out when they are going wrong but as we say, this current set of Ministers and this government have just written themselves out of the script, they have handed over the NHS basically to the whim of the market, Dermot.  That’s what this is all about at the end of the day, they want the market to decide but as I’m saying to you, the British public have never voted for that. 

DM: But the point is, to get back to what Jane Ellison said, you’re bringing in the market there, the P word, the privatisation word, she didn’t mention any of that.

ANDY BURNHAM: No, but why have they handed away control from Ministers, why have they done this?  The answer is because they want to put market forces at the heart of the NHS.  Commissioners now are mandated to put services out to open tender, we’re seeing privatisation now accelerating at a pace and scale we’ve never seen before.  That was the hidden agenda behind the Lansley Act and to be honest with you, Dermot, that goes to the heart of the battle we need to have at the coming general election about the future of the NHS.  I believe passionately in the public NHS, the NHS that we’ve got, just a few days ago rated again as the best health service in the world but sadly going downhill on this government’s watch.   This next election needs to be a proper debate about all of that.  We have a Prime Minister here who is selling off NHS services all over the country but nobody, nobody gave him permission to put our National Health Service up for sale and that needs to be the issue that voter hold him to account on in ten months’ time.

DM: Just a quick question about Ed Miliband, is he the best leader to put those point and others?  I suppose you think he’d be the second best leader because of course you stood against him in the Labour leadership election but are you four square behind Ed Miliband?   

ANDY BURNHAM: Absolutely, 100%.   Why is the media pressure building? It’s building because Ed Miliband has put us in a position where we can win the general election with ten months to go.  He is standing up to a lot of very powerful vested interests isn’t he, who don’t want him to win and this is the time now to stand our ground, hold on, get behind Ed and deliver this Labour victory that to be honest the people of my constituency desperately need.  

DM: You’re not aiming very high are you?  You’re trying to shore up the core vote.  We’ve seen one of those documents you had circulated internally before the Euro and local elections, it’s the so-called 35% strategy, things like the NHS that you are going to keep going on about.  

ANDY BURNHAM: I think that’s very unfair to be honest, Dermot.  I think Ed Miliband has surprised people with the scale of the policies that he’s put forward, the freeze on energy prices for instance, who has seen politicians doing that in recent times, actually saying we’re not just going to accept what these big global companies dictate, we are actually going to stand up for ordinary people.  That’s a break isn’t it with the way politics has been in recent time and then also saying helping people who are struggling, not able to get enough hours at work, again intervening to support people.  This is a big change to the way we’ve seen politics responding to the forces of globalisation in recent times and Ed Miliband, as I say, is leading that and standing up to some vested interests and not unsurprisingly they are now trying to fight back but this is the time to hold our nerve and get behind him.  I say to everybody in the  party if people can’t see that the media pressure is increasing because people are getting worried that Labour is now ten months away from a general election victory, then quite frankly they need to wake up to that.

DM: Mr Burnham, thank you very much indeed.  Shadow Health Secretary there, in Leigh in Lancashire.