Health Secretary Wes Streeting has ordered an independent review of NHS performance.

He wrote in a piece published by The Sun that the review will be lead by Lord Ara Darzi, one of the NHS' leading experts with more than 30 years' experience.

Streeting said he has asked Darzi to tell "the hard truths."

He added: "This government is going to be honest about the challenges facing us, and serious about solving them.

"We can turn the NHS around. But before we write the prescription, we need to diagnose the problem."

This comes as the latest waiting time figures for the NHS show the backlog for hospital care has gone up again, hitting 7.6 million.

It is the second month in a row the waiting list has gone up, but it is still below the 7.77 million peak recorded in September.

 He said: "This investigation will be the survey, before we draw up plans to rebuild it anew, so it can be there for all of us when we need it, once again.

"While this work is going on, we have hit the ground running in delivering on our first steps, including ramping up to the 40,000 extra appointments a week we promised in our manifesto."

Streeting also met with junior doctors earlier this week to discuss industrial action.