Budget Resolutions

Helen Morgan Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)]

The NHS continues to face a historic crisis after years of mismanagement by the last Conservative Government. Their dire legacy is still felt across the country, with hospitals crumbling and dental deserts across England—not least in my constituency—as well as a mental health crisis and many people struggling to access their GP, waiting hours for an ambulance or suffering in crammed hospital corridors. The British people deserve better.

The Liberal Democrats welcome efforts to bring down the sky-high waiting lists left by the previous Government, and there have been green shoots of recovery across the country. In the Shrewsbury and Telford hospital trust, which serves my constituents, performance against the 28-day faster diagnosis standard has reached 80.1%—the highest on record. I thank all the hard-working hospital staff there and across the country, who are working tirelessly at the moment to improve the situation.

There are some welcome announcements in the Budget. The prescription price freeze is clearly the right thing to do, and we strongly support protecting victims of the infected blood scandal and their families from inheritance tax. It is an unacceptable injustice for bereaved families to lose out just because their loved ones died waiting for compensation. We also support the lifting of the two-child benefit cap, because it is the type of investment that will reap savings in the future and correct a moral injury.

I am afraid, though, that overall this Budget does not meet the moment. The Government are treading water on their spending commitments, and hundreds of millions of pounds are set to be drained from services to fund a medicines price hike. From the Office for Budget Responsibility’s report, it is not clear whether frontline NHS services will be raided to pay higher prices for branded medicines at the behest of President Trump, on top of the billions already anticipated in the spending review. No. 10’s briefing suggests that the money will come from the NHS budget, yet we have just heard from the Secretary of State that it will not. A statement to this House to clarify the details would be most welcome.

Yesterday we learned that the Government have capitulated to the US Government and will increase spending on medicines by 0.3% of GDP—more than the value derived from some trade deals—or from about 9.5% of the NHS budget to 12%. We desperately need to understand how that will be paid for; I hope it will not be by cutting frontline services. The Secretary of State has previously said that he would not allow the NHS to be ripped off by drug companies, and I hope the Minister will confirm that position.

The life sciences sector is vital to the UK. Rather than defunding vital NHS services, the Liberal Democrats urge the Government to take real actions to strengthen it by implementing a new, bespoke customs union with the EU to slash red tape, along with a major boost to research and development funding so that new drugs can be brought online as quickly as possible. NHS spending should be targeted at where our health service really needs it: ending the crisis in GP services so that everyone has a right to see a GP in seven days, or in 24 hours if it is urgent; guaranteeing that 100% of patients are treated for cancer within 62 days of an urgent referral; and ending unacceptable and degrading corridor care. I urge the Government to adopt these proposals without delay in order to protect patients and prevent trust in our NHS from being irreparably broken.

One of the most visible symptoms of decline is our crumbling hospitals and the degrading scenes that became commonplace under the Conservatives. Those patients falsely promised a new hospital by the Conservatives will continue to be bitterly disappointed. We all know that the 40 new hospitals promised to patients did not number 40, that they were not necessarily new, that they were not all hospitals, and that there was no plan to fund them. However, this Government have chosen not to pledge new investment, which means that the maintenance backlog will continue to balloon at eye-watering levels, having climbed from £13.8 billion in 2023-24 to an astonishing £15.9 billion in 2024-25.

The Chancellor should have guaranteed that no patient, doctor or nurse faces the indignity of substandard, broken and, frankly, unsafe estates. We appreciate that there is pressure on the public finances, but holding back on these improvements is a false economy when a fortune is being spent papering over the cracks to keep substandard buildings that should be condemned limping on. The repair backlog at the sites of new hospitals is set to reach nearly £6 billion by the time construction is due to start. The Liberal Democrats will continue to champion investment in our crumbling NHS buildings in order to protect patients, hard-working NHS staff and the taxpayer.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is outlining an extensive programme of capital expenditure on the national health service. Between last year and this year, we have had the largest set of Budget increases in the history of this country, but are the Liberal Democrats proposing that we should tax the British public even further to pay for the kind of thing that she has just described?

[Helen Morgan]

If the right hon. Gentleman had listened to our leader’s response to the Budget, he would understand that the Liberal Democrats do not propose to tax the British taxpayer further. We would sign a customs union deal with the EU and create £25 billion in extra tax revenue every year without going back to the British taxpayer.

The crisis in our NHS is perhaps most acute in our community services. For all the welcome promises on shifting care from hospital to community and treatment to prevention, the truth is that local health services are on their knees, with record waits to see a GP. Liberal Democrats have championed new investment and we welcome the Government’s announcement on neighbourhood health centres, but unless we see health centres in every community, with investment to ensure that everyone can see a GP within a week as a legal right, and the restoration of public health funding, this risks being an expensive failure.

[Sarah Dyke (Glastonbury and Somerton) (LD)]

On neighbourhood health plans, St Dunstan’s House health and wellbeing centre and West Mendip primary care network are seeking to put together a preventive approach to crime, social and mental health issues in the Glastonbury area. Does my hon. Friend agree that this innovative, community-based project should be included in the second wave of neighbourhood health scheme applications?

[Helen Morgan]

We would all welcome that kind of innovative, community-led approach to improve local health services across the country.

The commitment to set up 250 neighbourhood health centres in communities by 2025 is clearly a welcome step, but there are 543 constituencies in England, so many communities will remain under-served. For example, my own constituency of North Shropshire is part of the pilot for neighbourhood health centres, for which we are grateful, but the numbers indicate that there may be only one neighbourhood health centre, although the constituency has five market towns, spread over a large distance and with different catchment areas. It is not one neighbourhood. Investment in our general practices is essential to ensure that people can continue to access primary care when they need it.

Neighbourhood health is not just about buildings—it is about how teams operate—but when so many local practices are constrained by the physical space in which they must work, buildings are an important part of the puzzle. There is a danger that rural and coastal communities continue to remain under-served and isolated, unable to access services that may be many miles away and only reachable by private car.

[Steff Aquarone (North Norfolk) (LD)]

My hon. Friend and I both represent rural constituencies that face similar challenges. Businesses in North Norfolk already face extra struggles to stay afloat, including training and retaining staff, finding affordable premises, and even things as simple as getting a strong and reliable phone and internet connection. Does she share my frustration that rather than tackling those problems, last week’s Budget has just lumbered rural businesses with more tax, more costs and more stress for the future?

[Helen Morgan]

I share my hon. Friend’s frustration.

Perhaps the most glaring and alarming omission of all in this Budget is that the words “adult social care” do not appear. The sector is already stretched to breaking point and is now suffering from the Government’s 2024 hike in employer national insurance contributions, which is unfunded for most businesses operating in that sector. The pressure is clearly reflected in the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services’ 2025 spring survey, which found that three quarters of directors have only

“partial or no confidence that their budgets are sufficient to meet their legal duties for prevention and wellbeing.”

That is not only terrible for disabled and vulnerable people; it is a disaster for the NHS. One in seven hospital beds are taken by someone who should be discharged but for whom there is no appropriate social care package. The situation could not be more pressing.

We need the cross-party talks to move far more quickly. As we have heard, there has been only one meeting, back in September, and there are no current plans for further engagement. I ask Ministers to ask the Prime Minister to lead those talks and to treat them with the seriousness and urgency that they deserve. We also need a solution to provide the social care beds needed to stop a devastating winter crisis; 2028 is too late for that.

In addition to spiralling NIC costs, there is increasing demand and huge staff shortages in the sector. With an immigration policy that is clearly designed to disincentivise overseas workers in this area, there is no clear plan to ensure how those vacancies will be filled. In formulating their 10-year workforce plan, the Liberal Democrats urge the Government to introduce a funded and higher minimum wage for carers, and a new royal college of care workers to improve training and career progression and to give carers the recognition that they deserve.

When social care is not available, family carers must step in to fill the need. A fairer deal for family carers, such as guaranteeing more respite care and introducing paid carer’s leave, would enable many to continue caring for longer at home. We want to see more support for young carers in school by introducing a young carers pupil premium. These are simple but potentially transformational steps in supporting the millions of carers without whom our health service would collapse.

Winter is quickly closing in, and there are signs that the annual winter crisis could be even worse this year, having already become a year-round permacrisis. The Budget should have funded an emergency package to prevent A&Es collapsing this winter. Liberal Democrats have called for 1,000 extra hospital beds, emergency social care places to free up places in hospitals, a recruitment and retention drive to increase the number of out-of-hours GPs, and a qualified clinician in every A&E waiting room to protect patients who are at risk but stuck on trollies. Without those measures, there is a significant risk of another winter of harrowing scenes of corridor care and ambulances queuing outside hospitals, which should have no place in our society.

Let us take a step back and ask what this Budget really means for the NHS. The topic of today’s debate is investment and renewal, but this Budget means cost pressures are left unaddressed and reforms that are confused and disorientating. Inflation is forecast to run higher than the budget set by the Department of Health and Social Care back in March 2025 for the spending review. As a result, average real-terms growth in departmental budgets has shrunk by 0.1% since then.

The OBR notes that spending on branded medicines alone is expected to rise by 25%—an extra £3.3 billion—between 2025-26 and 2028-29. For context, that is equivalent to the budget for maternity care in England. Yesterday’s recent agreement confirms that it will be at least that sum, and possibly as much as another £6 billion a year, which is an eye-watering amount. Industrial action could add a further £1.2 billion by 2028-29. It is hard to see what would be left to repair our GP services, expand social care or take any of the other measures needed to lift the NHS off the floor.

On top of that, we have no clarity on the impact of the reorganisation of NHS England and ICBs. The Chair of the Public Accounts Committee has warned that the Department has removed

“a key piece of machinery without articulating a clear plan for what comes next”

and compared the reforms with those of HS2.

The 10-year plan sets out a vision that Liberal Democrats share, but it is missing any clear explanation of how it will be funded within the spending review settlement. Nowhere, across 170 pages, is there a credible costing or delivery plan. Five months on, we still have no idea whether the Government can deliver the essential reforms that they have promised. Unless the Government adopt a genuine “spend to save” approach, investing now to prevent greater costs and worse outcomes later, we are at risk of seeing only managed decline, mounting pressure and the continued loss of faith in the health service.

Rather than Labour’s unfair tax rises, we have set out a number of fair ways to fund our public services properly. Most importantly, this Government are refusing properly to fix our broken relationship with Europe. We are calling for a new EU-UK customs union, which could raise more than £25 billion a year. The Government would have plenty of time to put the deal in place by 2030, raising billions in extra tax revenue in a fair way after 2030. We have also called for a targeted windfall tax on the big banks, which would raise £30 billion in total by 2030.

Let me take this opportunity to say to the Government that if we are to rescue the NHS, they must tackle the crisis at its front door and at its back door. That means investing in public health and early access to community services, including GPs, pharmacists and dentists, so that fewer people need to go to hospital in the first place. It also means fixing the crisis in social care to stop so many people being stuck in hospital beds. Only these measures can bring down waiting lists, improve the quality of care and help people live longer, healthier lives. The NHS needs transformational change; the Government must wake up from their complacency, or it will be patients who pay the price.