The Health Secretary admitted that Tory areas receive less for healthcare than Labour areas. Patricia Hewitt told the Health Select Committee: “It seems absolutely right and fair that places of health needs get greater funding.”
In an exchange with Mike Penning, the Conservative MP, Ms Hewitt said that her Leicester West constituency needed the £1,300 per person it received compared with the £1,000 a head received by his Hemel Hempstead constituents. She denied that funds were allocated according to whether areas had Labour MPs.
Ms Hewitt said the NHS’s financial problems had been caused by hiring too many doctors and nurses. Medical organisations and opposition MPs said that staff had been taken on to meet waiting list targets then made redundant once improvements were achieved. Ms Hewitt said: “I have said I will return the NHS as a whole to financial balance by the end of March.”