Labour launching health and social care commission 22 April 2013 Last updated at 02:22 Labour is to set up an independent commission to investigate how best to integrate health and social care. It says without such co-ordination there will be a £29bn gap in the health budget by 2020 because of "a rising need for care as society gets older." Ed Miliband is expected to say later that a Labour government must make money spent on the NHS go further. It follows former leader Tony Blair's warning to Mr Miliband to avoid promising ever more public spending. The independent commission will be led by former Department of Health specialist Sir John Oldham. Launching it in Lancashire later, Mr Miliband is expected to say the NHS is facing "the biggest challenge in its history." He will cite figures from the Nuffield Trust which suggest growing care needs will leave a shortfall of up to £29bn a year unless services can be delivered more efficiently. "The toughest financial pressures for 50 years are colliding with our rising need for care as society gets older and we see more people with chronic illnesses like cancer, diabetes and dementia," Mr Miliband will say. The NHS will always be a priority for expenditure under a Labour government, but we must make every pound we spend go further at a time when our NHS faces the risk of being overwhelmed by a crisis in funding because of care needs by the end of this decade. Working together BBC political correspondent Gary O'Donoghue said Mr Milband would contrast the approach of the Blair government - which was able to throw large amounts of money at the NHS - with the reality that there will not be anything like the resources for a future Labour government to do the same. It means a greater focus on preventing people getting ill and more care being provided directly in people's homes so they avoid unnecessary hospital visits End Quote Ed Miliband on Labour plans Mr Miliband will say that services should be organised "around the needs of patients, rather than patients around the needs of services." That means teams of doctors, nurses, social workers and therapists all working together. Care should be arranged by one person which would end "the frustration of families being passed around between different organisations and having to repeat the same information over and over again," he will say. He will add: "It means a greater focus on preventing people getting ill and more care being provided directly in people's homes so they avoid unnecessary hospital visits." Attacking coalition health reforms, he will say that "attempts to integrate care are being harmed by David Cameron's push to turn the NHS into a full-blown market." His plans will be based on "co-operation and integration rather than imposing fragmentation and free market ideology," he will add. The government's NHS shake-up in England came into force on 1 April with GP-led groups put in charge of a large chunk of the NHS budget. It was partly designed to encourage greater involvement from the private sector which has opened up the government to claims it is going to privatise the health service. Ministers have responded by saying the changes will introduce competition in a managed and balanced way. Earlier this month, Tony Blair, writing for the New Statesman, issued a warning to Mr Miliband against the return of the "familiar old left/right battles." He said it was important that the Labour Party did not "tack right on immigration and Europe, and tack left on tax and spending."