Civil servants will thwart plans to fix NHS because they want reforms done slowly, warn MPs

CIVIL servants and bureaucrats will thwart plans to fix the NHS because they want reforms done slowly, a report by MPs warns.

Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee said officials in NHS England and the Department of Health are “out of ideas and remarkably complacent”.

A review by Lord Ara Darzi found ranks in Whitehall back offices have swollen while waiting lists have ballooned and patient satisfaction declined.

The PAC accused health officials of being too cautious and blighted by “short-termism”.

Tory MP Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said: “The Government has transformative ambitions to address the issues plaguing the NHS.

“We were aghast to find some of the worst complacency amongst senior officials in charge of delivering these ambitions.

“Truly fresh ideas and radical energy must be generated to meet the scale of what is required.

“Given the position of the NHS, stale platitudes of incremental change are simply not going to cut it.”

An NHS spokesperson said: “This report contains basic factual inaccuracies and a flawed understanding of how the NHS and the government’s financial processes work.

“While NHS productivity is now improving at double pre-pandemic levels - far from being complacent, NHS England has repeatedly been open about the problem and the actions being taken to address it.

“Reform is part of the NHS’ DNA and has ensured performance improvements for patients in the past year despite capital starvation, unprecedented strikes and a fragile social care sector.”

The Department of Health said: “We have been consistently clear that fixing the broken NHS and ensuring it is fit for the future requires urgent and radical reform.”