The government’s 10 Year Health Plan is set to make a difference to working class communities through tackling the country’s stark differences in equality through redirecting funding to areas that need it most.
Working-class people and those who live in coastal towns are more likely to spend more of their lives unwell, and life expectancy for women with the lowest incomes has fallen recently, despite decades of progress. These areas need the NHS most often, and yet typically have the fewest GPs, the worst performing services, and the longest waitlists.
GP surgeries that serve working-class communities, for example, receive an average of ten per cent less funding per patient than practices in more affluent areas.
The 10 Year Health Plan, therefore, will include government plans to rebuild the NHS by tackling widening equalities in people’s health, which are exacerbated by deprived areas not getting the funding they need.
Difficult cuts across trusts and integrated care boards (ICBs) as well as tackling projected deficits will free up £2.2 billion previously set aside for deficit support, which can be directly reinvested into critical resources where they are most needed like rural areas, coastal towns, and working-class communities across England.
Deficit funding will be phased out entirely from the financial year 2026-27, so systems that fail to meet their agreed financial plans will not receive a reward. Instead, struggling trusts will be required to set out activity and costs so they can take steps to improve under a tougher financial regime.
Wes Streeting, health and social care secretary, will announce this change later today during a speech in the North West. He is expected to say: “The truth is, those in greatest need often receive the worst quality healthcare. It flies in the face of the values that NHS was founded on. The circumstances of your birth shouldn’t determine your worth. A core ambition of our 10 Year Plan will be to restore the promise of the NHS, to provide first class healthcare for everyone in our courtly and end the postcode lottery.
“Last year we sent crack teams of top clinicians to hospitals in parts of the country with the highest waiting lists and levels of economic activity. It has seen waiting lists in those areas falling twice as fast as the rest of the country, helping get sick Brits back to health and back to work.
“Thanks to the reform we’ve made to bear down on wasteful spending, we can now invest the savings in working-class communities that need it most. Where towns have the greatest health needs and fewest GPs, we will prioritise investment to rebuilt your NHS and rebuild the health of you community.”
