However, Mr Brown avoided equivalent cuts to the Scottish and Welsh NHS budgets even though the funding formula for the UK nations suggests they should have shared the pain. That decision leaves him open to criticism that he favoured patients in his home country.

Those familiar with the situation said the cut to NHS capital spending implied a very tight settlement for the health department for the next three years in October’s Comprehensive Spending Review and indicated a slowdown in hospital building.

The health department’s surrender of £2bn in capital is all the more remarkable because the NHS needs the money and it had not been given greater day-to-day money to spend.

The private finance initiative hospital programme has already been cut from a future programme of £12bn to £8bn, with further reduction likely, amid worries the inflexible payments PFI demands do not fit well with the new system of money following the patients. Big hospital reconfigurations are due in some parts of the country that will inevitably require capital.

The Treasury Friday night confirmed the NHS capital budget had been “adjusted”. But it indicated that, although it was not yet published, it would allocate the missing £2bn to spend to English hospitals over three years from 2008-09.

No published health spending plans exist for these years yet, so hospitals will not be able to verify that the money is additional.

The cut was slipped out in the March Budget, when Mr Brown referred only to spending on day-to-day NHS services when he said “the money available for investment and reform in the NHS in England will be £8bn more than this year, the biggest cash increase ever”.

From:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/f7a994d0-2677-11dc-8e18-000b5df10621.html

That Stalinist Brown had shifted the goal posts for PFI hospital building is not new- please see below. But his rigging of hospital building funds in England and Scotland shows a new level of contempt for the voters.

On 18 Jun 07 Health Direct posted: NHS service cuts urged at non PFI hospitals when Primary care trusts wanting to reconfigure services were given a stark message in an economic analysis prepared for the NHS in London: financially, it will make sense to cut beds and services at non private finance initiative (PFI) hospitals.

Sharon Massey, cabinet member for health and adult social services at Bexley council, which covers Sidcup- one of the areas covered, said: ‘We are devastated that Queen Mary’s is coming out as the most vulnerable hospital. There is effectively a mortgage on other hospitals. Queen Mary’s does not have a mortgage so is easy to dispose of.’

The paper focuses on south east London but arguments would apply in other areas with a mix of PFI and non-PFI hospitals.

Imperial College London professor of health policy Nick Bosanquet also sent out a warning. He said: ‘There will be a temptation to say “we are stuck with these contracts, we will close down older hospitals which may in fact be lower cost”.