NHS will become ‘neighbourhood health service’, Streeting pledges

Wes Streeting will promise to turn the NHS into a “neighbourhood health service” as he launches a major consultation about the institution’s next decade.

The Health Secretary is set to invite patients and NHS staff to take part in a “national conversation” to shape the Government’s 10-year plan for the service next week, a central plank of Labour’s health policy.

In Opposition, the party pledged to build “an NHS fit for the future”, with a greater emphasis on preventing ill-health, shifting care from hospitals to community and harnessing the latest technology to improve care.

Announcing the consultation on Sunday, Mr Streeting said: “If we want to save the things we love about the NHS, then we have to change it.

Our 10-year health plan will preserve the NHS’s traditional values in a modern setting

Health Secretary Wes Streeting

“Our 10-year health plan will turn the NHS on its head – transforming it into a neighbourhood health service – powered by cutting-edge technology that helps us stay healthy and out of hospital.

“We will rebuild the health service around what patients tell us they need.”

Some areas of Labour’s plan have already been sketched out, with perhaps one of the biggest being the creation of new neighbourhood health centres.

These are intended to be based closer to people’s homes than their nearest hospital and enable them to see GPs, district nurses, care workers and other medical professionals in the same building.

The Department for Health and Social Care said this would stop patients “having to go from pillar to post” and enable them to be treated for minor injuries “without having to wait for hours in overstretched hospitals”.

Combining GP surgeries with other neighbourhood services has been tried on several occasions before, including in parts of London in the 1920s and 1930s prior to the creation of the NHS.

The last Labour government attempted to introduce a similar idea after Lord Ara Darzi, who wrote the current Government’s rapid review of the state of the NHS, recommended creating a series of “polyclinics” in London and GP-led health centres elsewhere.

They encountered stiff opposition from doctors and some patients who were concerned that they would end up having to travel further to see a GP, especially outside of major cities.

The plans were paused and then scrapped by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government in 2010.

On Sunday, Mr Streeting stressed the importance of patients’ relationship with their GP, saying it was one of the things the Government wanted to protect along with free healthcare at the point of need and shorter waiting times for appointments.

He said: “Our 10-year health plan will preserve the NHS’s traditional values in a modern setting.”

The plan is also expected to include greater roles for wearable technology to help people monitor their health and creating a single health record that patients can view through the NHS app.

This must go hand-in-hand with sustainable funding and investment, particularly for capital, an end to chronic workforce shortages and more support to meet growing demand, not just in hospitals but across mental health, community and ambulance services too

Saffron Cordery, NHS Providers

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) welcomed plans to shift treatment from hospitals to communities, but general secretary Nicola Ranger said the NHS “simply does not have the nursing numbers to deliver it”.

She said: “Without new investment, the number of community nurses will stay on track to be half what it was two decades ago.

“Nursing staff are ready to help deliver the modernisation our health service needs, but staff are overworked and chronically undervalued.

“We were the only NHS profession to reject the Government’s pay award. Reforms must come with the investment needed to turn around nursing.”

The NHS has been reported to be in line for a real-terms budget increase when the Chancellor announces her spending plans on October 30, although Government sources have said suggestions of a 3-4% increase are not accurate.

But health policy experts have suggested such an increase would be necessary to deliver on Labour’s plans to improve the NHS and bring waiting lists down.

Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, also said more funding would be needed to deliver the Government’s plan.

She said: “Trust leaders will work with the Government to get to grips with the challenges facing health and social care and to deliver improvements.

“They know the NHS needs to work differently and go further and faster to improve care for patients.

“However, this must go hand-in-hand with sustainable funding and investment, particularly for capital, an end to chronic workforce shortages and more support to meet growing demand, not just in hospitals but across mental health, community and ambulance services too.”