Contradictory assessments of Better Together leader’s claim that spending on health service has increased under the coalition

Alistair Darling has been accused of acting as “defender-in-chief” of NHS cuts in England, as independent thinktanks offered contradictory assessments of his claim that spending on the health service had increased under the coalition.

In a radio interview on this morning’s Good Morning Scotland, the Better Together leader stated: “Spending on the NHS increased right through the term of the Labour government, it has carried on increasing for the last four years under the present government and it is set to increase again.”

The yes campaign immediately accused Darling of contradicting his own party in Westminster, referring to the shadow health secretary, Andy Burnham, who wrote to the UK Statistics Authority in 2012 to complain of “misleading claims on NHS spending by government ministers.” Specifically, he took issue with the coalition pledge that spending on health would rise in every year of this parliament.

The Authority’s chair, Andrew Dilnot, replied that the best available data suggested that in 2011-12 there has been a slight dip in spending, but that the budget had remained largely flat in real terms since the coalition took office.

Burnham took this as a victory, and last month said: “If we allow the continued advance of the market into the NHS it will eventually destroy everything that’s precious about it.”

This afternoon, the Scottish government’s health secretary, Alex Neil, capitalised on Darling’s remarks, saying:

As leader of the no campaign, Alistair Darling has become the defender-in-chief of Tory cuts. In Scotland Mr Darling assures us that no political party could get away with destroying the NHS – but in Westminster his colleagues say the Tories are doing exactly that.

In Scotland, Mr Darling assure us that the Tories are increasing health spending - but his own Labour colleagues at Westminster don’t believe this. Even Labour’s Health Minister in Wales is saying that Tory cuts threaten the NHS in Wales – yet now Alistair Darling apparently believes the NHS is safe in the Tories’ hands.”

On the specific issue of NHS funding under the coalition, Andy McKeon, senior fellow at the Nuffield Trust, supported the former chancellor, saying:

Alistair Darling is right to say there have been increases each year in the English health budget since the coalition came to power. The amount of cash has risen each year and this has kept the budget marginally ahead of inflation, meaning a very small rise in real terms. This will be reflected in the funding Scotland gets through the Barnett formula. Whether such increases continue for the English NHS will depend on the incoming government after the 2015 election.”

However, Richard Murray, director of policy at The King’s Fund, contradicted this, saying that the NHS budget over the last four years had been broadly flat in real terms:



Since 2010, the NHS budget has been broadly flat, while this is generous compared to other areas of public spending, increasing demand for care means that services are under huge pressure.”

Allyson Pollock, professor of public health research and policy at Queen Mary University of London and an expert on NHS privatisation, referred to a 2012 paper on the risks Scotland faces of a decrease in NHS spending through the Barnett Formula allocation.

She added:

In England there is no longer any entitlement to universal healthcare after the national health service was in effect abolished by the 2012 Health and Social Care act. So Scots already enjoy entitlements through devolution that their neighbours in England do not.