Yet more tales of NHS waste

The main problem with the government claiming they are "investing" in the NHS three times as much money as the Tories did is that the NHS is still a complete shambles.  Actually what they are saying, to spin the story another way, is that the government is wasting three times as much money on the NHS as the Tories did pre-1997.  It isn't any wonder that they are spending so much either, when you consider this - yet another tale of waste; this time from the Welsh Assembly.  The Welsh Conservatives have exposed that £34.6m of public money -set aside for frontline health care- has been spent on employing private firms for external consultancy.  Tory health spokesman Jonathan Morgan has rightly pointed out "-These figures are utterly scandalous. Labour preaches to us time and again that expenditure on the NHS is at an all-time high but what good is that if the money isn’t being spent on the front line?-"

Records on consultancy spending by Welsh Health Boards have only been available since the Assembly was formed in 1999.  Yet in the short period alone, there has been a whopping increase of spending by 417%!  In 1999-2000, the amount spent on external consultants was £1.75m, with year on year raises to £9.07m in 2005-06; a total of £34.62m in just seven years.  When the implementation of the Modernising Medical Careers (MMC) programme begins on 1st August, it will be of little consolation to the one in two doctors in training out of the job and the countless number of patients who will not be able to receive proper treatment due to poor workforce planning that Labour have increased their spending on the NHS.  It is clear that they can not be trusted to spend the money because they have no idea where to spend it best.