Henry Smith
Main Page: Henry Smith (Conservative - Crawley)Department Debates - View all Henry Smith's debates with the Northern Ireland Office
(10 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister
What I would say to the right hon. Lady is that of course there are pressures in the NHS but I think it is worth listening to the new chief executive of NHS England—someone who worked for the Labour party when it was in government—who said:
“Over the past five years…the NHS has been remarkably successful…We’re treating millions more patients than five years ago...the NHS has become some £20 billion more efficient”.
Those are things that we should recognise. Of course there are pressures, but what we need, and Simon Stevens says this very clearly, is improved efficiency and to make sure that we get rid of unnecessary demand for the NHS by investing in public health—and, yes, money is required. But as Simon Stevens puts it, we get more money only if we have a successful economy. As he said,
“a tax-funded health service requires a healthy UK economy”.
We have a healthy UK economy, and we will have a strong NHS.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
Q14. A recent TaxPayers Alliance study revealed that the amount of taxpayers’ money being spent on union office space is the equivalent of £27.4 million at London market value, with a square footage equivalent to that of the Kremlin. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is time for further political funding reform?
The Prime Minister
I think it is necessary to cap the donations that unions make to parties and that should be introduced. My hon. Friend comes up with an ingenious idea: if trade unions have so much extra space, maybe they should do what the Government are doing and make additional space available to entrepreneurs so that we can have more start-ups and more enterprise. That is a contribution that the trade unions could make.