Tories Pledge ‘Independent NHS’

The Tories are to pledge to hand day-to-day control of the NHS to an independent board, as part of reforms aimed at making it more autonomous.

They say the board should allocate billions of pounds to primary care trusts across England, and oversee the commissioning of services.

Ministers would appoint board members, set objectives and hold it to account.

Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt has ruled out a similar plan, saying the NHS was too vast to be run by a board.

BBC political correspondent James Landale said the proposals, to be announced on Wednesday, formed the party’s first detailed and concrete policy pledge on the public services.

He said the Conservatives believed the NHS should have more autonomy but should also be made more accountable through strengthened health watchdogs and new patients’ groups.

The proposals would mean substantial powers being handed over to the independent board, which would report directly to Parliament, if the Conservatives took power at the next general election.

The board would allocate funds to primary care trusts and oversee the commissioning of NHS services, in line with objectives agreed with the health secretary.

Other proposals to increase independence for the NHS include empowering NHS Foundation Trusts to invest and expand and taking away the power of the health secretary to set prices of NHS procedures.

To make it more accountable, the party proposes giving more power to planned patients’ watchdogs known as Local Involvement Networks and requiring all primary care trusts to publish annual improvement plans.

And it proposes streamlining the bodies which inspect the NHS, so one focuses on economic performance, another on quality and value for money of care.

The Tories would also set up a new national organisation, Healthwatch, to represent patients and would enshrine 10 “core principles” of the NHS in legislation.

Prime minister-in-waiting Gordon Brown was last year thought to favour handing day-to-day control of the NHS to an independent board – in 1997 he gave up control of interest rates and handed responsibility to the Bank of England.

But last week Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt appeared to rule that out.

She said the NHS was too vast and the proposal – which has been backed by the British Medical Association – would not work.

In a speech she said: “The NHS is four times the size of the Cuban economy and more centralised.

“That is part of its problem, and the problem can’t be solved by proposing that a modern health service be run like a 1960s nationalised industry.”

But she supported an NHS constitution, and giving more powers to patients, GPs and health staff.