NHS England: petition hand-in

This is a guest blog from Tamasin Cave at Spinwatch. 38 Degrees members have teamed up with Spinwatch to uncover the truth on NHS England’s big spending.

“Today I went to NHS England to hand over our 75,000-strong petition demanding that they come clean about how the executives are spending NHS money. Because the people that Jeremy Hunt put in charge of our NHS won’t tell us who they’ve been giving big chunks of NHS money to. They won’t say how much is being given to private lobbying firms or profit-hungry management consultants.

This is a very different NHS England from the one NHS England promotes. Earlier this year, for example, it launched something called NHS Citizens, the express purpose of which is to listen to people’s views on the NHS, get them involved in decision-making and create a ‘new culture of collaboration between NHS England and the public’. ‘NHS England wants you to be actively involved at its very heart,’ it says. It’s ‘all about listening,’ says Simon.

And NHS England, like all other government agencies, is required every month to make public all its spending over £25,000. It never has. This summer, when asked about the anomaly, NHS England said it would publish the data in September. We are still waiting. Now NHS England knows that a lot of people care about where the money is going – so this might be the tipping point for them finally publishing the information.

Let’s hope that NHS England is listening. And then does what it should have been doing all along: tell us how they are spending our money.”