NHS spending per person will be cut next year, ministers confirm

NHS spending per person will be cut next year, ministers confirm The Government will cut the National Health Service’s budget per person in real terms next year, ministers have admitted in official figures for the first time. Numbers released by ministers show NHS England will face a sharp reduction of 0.6 per cent in real terms of per head in the financial year 2018-19.
The numbers corroborate claims by NHS chief Simon Stevens earlier this month that “in 2018-19, real-terms NHS spending per person in England is going to go down”. The figures also fly in the face of the Government’s public insistence that it is investing more in the health service, with Jeremy Hunt and Theresa May repeating the mantra of an extra £10bn for the NHS. The Independent

That claim was debunked by the cross-party Health Committee in the summer, whose chair, Tory MP Sarah Wollaston, said the number was both “incorrect” and “risks giving a false impression that the NHS is awash with cash”.
The Liberal Democrats said the figures show Tory claims of investment were “disingenuous” while Labour said the Government should use the March budget to close the black hole opening up in the health service’s finances. In a written statement to the House of Commons health minister Philip Dunne said NHS England’s per capita real terms budget would increase by 3.2 per cent in 2016-17 financial year.
However growth would fall sharply next year, down to just a 0.9 per cent increase in 2017. It would then go negative by 2018-19 with a 0.6 per cent fall in real spending per head in that financial year.
Growth would remain very low in 2019-20 at 0.2 per cent and 0.9 per cent in the years following. The wider health budget outside the NHS is facing even more sustained cuts, with two years of shrinking resource per head and a maximum growth rate of 0.4 per cent after this year. This includes staff training and public health.