“Keir Starmer is right to diagnose the importance of prevention in tackling the Tory NHS crisis. But his prescriptions miss the elephant in the room, and risk compounding the problem,” Kate Dove, Momentum Co-Chair, said, responding to Labour’s briefing of its health mission to be announced by the Party leader tomorrow (Monday).

“Our NHS is on its knees as a result of more than a decade of Tory austerity and under-investment, resulting in record, deadly waiting times and staff leaving in droves. We will not fix this crisis without a major, real-terms investment boost, both to tackle the ongoing recruitment crisis, and to adapt to an ageing society.”

She added: “As Keir Starmer once suggested, we should also end NHS outsourcing, while putting an end to the NHS privatisation which has driven this crisis, instead of Wes Streeting’s calls for more private sector use of the NHS. Mission-driven requirement requires long-term solutions, not sticking plasters and toothless promises. It’s time for the Labour leadership to listen to members, trade unions and the public – and return our NHS to its founding principles.”

Both Starmer and Streeting have previously been criticised by Labour’s own healthcare affiliate, the Socialist Health Association, for their failure to advocate for NHS renationalisation. Streeting instead suggestion that he “wouldn’t pour resources in” and “reform would do the heavy lifting”.

But it’s not just the SHA that have concerns. The Labour leader’s position contradicts the agreed policy platform of his own Party. At the Party’s Annual Conference last year, the SHA moved a motion which stated that Labour would adopt “a position of outright opposition to and commit to vote against any and all forms of privatisation of the NHS” and “commit to returning all privatised portions of the NHS to public control upon forming a Government”.

This position was passed unanimously by every single union and local party delegate. See Composite 15, page 10.  Starmer’s shift in position from this popular and principled stand will likely further inflame charges of hypocrisy if he abandons his pledge to end NHS outsourcing.

Image: Norfolk And Norwich University Hospital, Norfolk. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NHS_NNUH_entrance.jpg, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.