BRITAIN: Just 24 hours after its promise of a railway system fit for the 21st century, Britain's Labour Government yesterday pledged to free the country's top-performing hospitals from Whitehall control.
However the decision of the Health Secretary, Mr Alan Milburn, to allow private companies, charities and universities take over the running of failing hospitals provoked charges of "backdoor privatisation" of the National Health Service.
Announcing his fundamental shake-up, Mr Milburn suggested it was not possible to simply treat the NHS as "the last great nationalised industry" and said top-down control had stifled local innovation. "Our reforms are about redefining what we mean by the NHS;changing it from a monolithic, centrally run monopoly to a values-based system where different health-care providers - in the public, private and voluntary sectors - provide comprehensive services to NHS patients," he said.
Insisting this was "not privatisation in any way, shape or form" Mr Milburn said: "Who provides the service becomes less important than the service that is provided." However Mr David Hinchliffe, chairman of the Commons Select Committee on Health, said the move to give private managers "franchises" to take-over failing hospitals was "incredibly worrying," adding: "I am finding it increasingly difficult to differentiate between my own (Labour) government's health policies and those of the previous Conservative government."
Amid fears of a two-tier health service, some public service unions warned the changes could trigger a wave of strikes as staff at neighbouring hospitals compete over pay and conditions.
Against the backdrop of industrial unrest across much of the rail network, the leader of the GMB union, Mr John Edmonds, warned the government the public did not want to see the NHS become the "new Railtrack."