London, March 14: British Health Secretary Andrew Lansley may review parts of his controversial NHS shake-up in the face of mounting pressure from general practitioners (gps), unions and even his coalition partners.
The pressure peaked during the weekend after a petition by the campaign group 38 Degrees against the plans gathered more than 80,000 signatures.
The 140,000-member British Medical Association is also to discuss opposing the reforms in an emergency meeting scheduled for Tuesday.
Based on the proposals by Lansley, the government will hand over control of 80 percent of NHS spending on commissioning treatment for patients to gps.
This comes as the Liberal Democrat partners of Lansley in the coalition also voted overwhelmingly in the party’s Spring Conference for major changes to the NHS reform plans.
With an eye to the strong opposition to the proposals, Lansley has confirmed that “our proposals are always under review.”
“As you put a bill through parliament you look carefully at how the legislation delivers in the context of the reforms that we set out. We’ve already made changes. We are not sitting there thinking we must know the answers and nothing can change,” he said.
Lib Dems are calling for guarantees in the health reform bill to ensure private sector service providers do not “cherry pick” the NHS moneymaker services as well as safeguards for the involvement of elected local council representatives in the commissioning processes.
Liberal Democrats are apparently worried about the ‘privatization’ of the NHS, which, according to one source, “could be worse for us than tuition fees.”
This comes as the 38 Degrees seems adamant to press ahead with its demands with the online group’s executive director David Babbs warning, “38 Degrees members have proved with the forest sell-off that when we come together in big numbers, it’s possible to make the government think again.”
——–Agencies