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Today’s Conservatives want to do
Today’s Conservatives want to do what not even Margaret
Thatcher would countenance – introducing charges for hospital
operations so that those who can afford to pay thousands of
pounds can push ahead of those who cannot. As well as ending
the founding principle of the health service, this would take
more than £1 billion out of the system to subsidise those who
can afford to pay. For the rest of us, the Tories would abandon
waiting-list targets and allow a return to the 18-month waits
that were their NHS legacy. The choice is forward with new
Labour to a health system with patients in the driving seat, free
to all and personal to each of us. Or back with the Tories to longer
waits, and to a health system where treatment depends not on
your condition but on your bank balance.