NHS boss says promise of £8bn in extra funding may be far from enough

NHS boss says promise of £8bn in extra funding may be far from enough Simon Stevens uses major speech to NHS leaders to remind Jeremy Hunt that 2014 blueprint said up to £21bn may be needed

The boss of the NHS has told Jeremy Hunt that the health service may need closer to £21bn extra over the next few years, far more than the £8bn ministers have promised.

In pointed remarks made on Friday and aimed at the health secretary, Simon Stevens said people should not “rewrite history” on the exact sums the NHS in England will need by 2020. Hunt has repeatedly stressed that the government has pledged to boost the NHS budget by £8bn over that period because that is the amount set out in a blueprint unveiled in 2014 called the NHS Five Year Forward View, which Hunt, David Cameron and George Osborne now call “the Stevens plan”. Continue reading... The Guardian