Ben Bradshaw is confident of achieving 18 week target
In a letter to the Financial Times editor (but to their credit buried by the FT in it’s website) was published:
From Ben Bradshaw MP.
Sir, Contrary to your report “NHS to miss treatment wait targets” (September 10), we are confident of achieving the historic milestone of a maximum
18-week wait from GP to treatment by next year. Indeed, in some parts of the country this is already happening.
Nor has the government gone cool on the contribution made by the independent sector in helping reduce waiting and extend choice.
We recently approved another independent provider to boost services in Lancashire and Cumbria and expect to make further such approvals in the months to come.
Ben Bradshaw,
Health Minister
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8afc0168-5f36-11dc-837c-0000779fd2ac.html
Health Direct can not believe the stupidity of Ben Bradshaw’s statement which he had to write to counter the Financial Times’s damming research:
“Confident of achieving 18-week wait promise”- not by a quarter of the population,
“in some parts of the country this is already happening”- even the Financial Time article states teh blooming obvious that half the country is covered
“recently approved another independent provider”- splendid, but what aboout the rest of the country?
Health Direct covered the research NHS to miss 18 week treatment waiting times targets- by the proverbial country mile on Mon 10 Sept 2007- The National Health Service is set to fall well short of its target of ensuring that no one waits more than 18 weeks from seeing a family doctor to completion of treatment, latest official figures predict.
But while the figures point to waits for diagnostic tests being a key contributor to delays in treatment, private sector contracts originally designed to deliver 1.5m extra tests a year are still being held up by an ever lengthening review in the Department of Health of whether they should go ahead.
in January, when the figures were first collected, 47 per cent of patients completed their treatment within 18 weeks. By June that figure had risen to 54 per cent – a 7 percentage-point improvement in six months.
But with only 18 months to go, progress at the same rate would still leave 25 per cent of patients waiting more than 18 weeks. In June, 25,000 of the patients treated had waited more than a year, and almost 75,000 more than six months.
Anthony Harrison, an academic at the King’s Fund think-tank who is following the 18-week target, said: “With previous targets to cut waits for surgery there has always been an acceleration towards the end, with the figures improving faster as the deadline nears.”
“But this target is different. It cannot be achieved just by doing more of the same – more operations or more outpatient appointments. It requires changes to the way services are provided so that, for example, scans and tests can be performed and a decision made on treatment on the same day. That is organisationally much more difficult to achieve.”
As an example of practical realities, Alan Johnson has just confirmed that as more data is being compiled, in the actual rate of treatment in Gloucestershire has gone DOWN from 51% in March 2007 to 48% in June 2007. Courtesy of:
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2007-09-12a.155305.h
For more information on the Barking Ben Bradshaw Health Direct provides details from Wikipedia and They Work for You:
Ben Bradshaw MP
Benjamin Peter James Bradshaw (born 30 August 1960 in London) is a British politician and the Labour Member of Parliament for Exeter
The Minister of State in the Department of Health and Minister for the South West was one of the first openly gay MPs.
In Parliament Bradshaw introduced the Pesticides Act in 1998 [1], which gave more powers to inspectors. He became a Parliamentary Private
Secretary to the Minister of State at the Department of Health John Denham in 2000. After the 2001 General Election Bradshaw entered Tony Blair’s government as the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Only days after being appointed to the Foreign Office he had to answer questions following the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001.
Bradshaw became the Deputy to the Leader of the House of Commons Robin Cook in 2002, and was an Under Secretary of State at the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2003 until 2006, when he was made a Minister of State at the same department.
On 28 June 2007 he was moved to become a Minister of State in the Department of Health and was also given the responsibility of being Minister for the South West.
His support for the Iraq War proved unpopular amongst many in a seat with a high student population.
When first elected in 1997, Ben Bradshaw was one of the first gay MPs to be out at the time he was initially elected, along with Stephen Twigg.
He lives with his partner, Neal Dalgleish, who is a BBC producer on 24 June 2006, Bradshaw and his partner undertook a civil partnership ceremony, the first MP to do so . He does not own a car; instead he frequently cycles. His brother is Jonathan Bradshaw, CBE, Professor of Social Policy at the University of York.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Bradshaw
How Ben Bradshaw has voted on key issues since 2001:
* Has never voted on a transparent Parliament.
* Voted moderately for introducing a smoking ban.
* Voted strongly for introducing ID cards.
* Voted very strongly for introducing foundation hospitals.
* Voted strongly for introducing student top-up fees.
* Voted very strongly for Labour’s anti-terrorism laws.
* Voted very strongly for the Iraq war.
* Voted very strongly against investigating the Iraq war.
* Voted very strongly for replacing Trident.
* Voted moderately for the fox hunting ban.
* Voted strongly for equal gay rights.
