Labour’s promises on health are setting the party up to fail

Keir Starmer is making big, conflicting, and unrealistic promises on health, without a clear plan for delivering them, which is setting Labour up to fail.In a speech at a Braintree ambulance station on Monday 22 May 2023, Starmer, leader of the Labour party, committed a Labour government to meeting a raft of targets that haven’t been hit for years, saying, “Ambulances—seven minutes for cardiac arrest. A&E—back to the four hour target. GPs—the highest satisfaction levels on record. Waiting lists—down. Planned treatment within 18 weeks. No backsliding, no excuses—we will meet these standards again.”1As if that isn’t enough to keep a new government busy, he also committed Labour to improving healthy life expectancy and halving the inequality gap between English regions.He claimed this would be achieved by diagnosing 75% of all cancers at stage 1 or 2—which would require a huge performance leap2—and cutting heart attacks and strokes by a quarter…
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