Today is a landmark day for the NHS. The widely-expected decision to allow top-up payments is a welcome move – for all the reasons outlined by my former colleague Helen Rainbow, of Reform, in a blog post for Centre Right last week.
The key victory here is for patient choice. Whereas before, in some cases, a patient would have been forced to go private if they wanted the very best and most up-to-the-minute treatments, now they can access them within the NHS – provided, of course, that they stump up the extra cash.
Sure, there’s an argument that we should expect the best treatment on the NHS anyway – given the amount of taxpayers’ money it hoovers up. But the fact remains that – at the moment – that’s often not available. Better a system in which it is.
Not that that should be an excuse for the Government to allow the standard of non-topped-up treatment to stagnate or worsen, under the thinking that “if you want good care, you’ve got to pay for it”. Provided that doesn’t happen, there’s nothing – as Iain Dale points out – intrinsically wrong with a “two-tier” system. A pity, then, that Andrew Lansley’s attack line seems to suggest that there is. If anything, top-ups usher in a model which could enable expensive future treatments to be borne by the system, and which – through vouchers etc. – could bring about better care for all.
Reform doesn’t come natually to Gordon Brown – and there are rumblings that he was given a push from the EU in this case. But, even so, we can pencil in top-ups on the sparsely-populated list of good things to happen under his government. Now let’s hope the implementation doesn’t embarass the original idea.
Comments