James Forsyth James Forsyth

Doctor Hunt

The new Health Secretary wants to cure the NHS

‘I would like to be the person who safeguards Andrew Lansley’s legacy,’ says Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, as he sits in his new office. Hunt is touchingly eager to praise his predecessor. He predicts that Lansley ‘will be seen as the architect of the modern NHS’ and stresses that he is in regular touch ‘to make sure that I learn as much as I can from him, because I don’t think there is anyone who knows more about the NHS than Andrew’.

But if Lansley was such a paragon, why was he moved? Hunt replies defensively: ‘You’d have to ask David Cameron about that.’ A few moments later, he is more forthcoming: ‘What has happened, because the reforms were so far reaching, we have had a big debate about structures and I think we need to move on from there and talk about why those structures are going to make a difference to patients.’ Hunt who (normally) speaks English, not just NHS, is perhaps better suited to this task than his technocratic predecessor.

Another striking difference between them is their views on the future of the NHS budget. When The Spectator interviewed Andrew Lansley at Christmas, he was clear that he believed that the health budget would have to carry on rising in real terms until, well, kingdom come — and that the next spending round and Tory manifesto would have to commit to that. Hunt is not prepared to guarantee this. ‘I don’t think it’s possible to make a prediction because there is so much uncertainty in the economic outlook and no one knows what is going to happen with the eurozone.’

When I push him on this apparent break with his predecessor, Hunt panics a little, and emphasises ‘how passionately committed David Cameron is to protecting the NHS budget for the very reasons that Andrew laid out’.

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