NHS Bill "not fit for purpose"

The NHS Future Forum, made up of handpicked staff, community and patient representatives, will set out today why and how it believes the government should amend its stalled Health and Social Care Bill.

The forum, established by Mr Cameron, has been tasked with gathering the views of doctors, nurses and patients.

Mr Cameron claimed that the government had listened to concerns about the Bill raised during the initiative, which saw more than 200 events held across the country.

But Unite the union national officer for health Rachael Maskell dismissed the ploy, calling for the Bill to go altogether.

She said: "It is time to scrap the Bill and conduct a proper review of what is needed for the long-term needs of the NHS and our nation's health, rather than rush through a biased, lop-sided listening exercise."

A Unison spokeswoman also reiterated the union's view that the Bill should be scrapped, adding that "fiddling around on the edges is not going to make this Bill any more sensible for patients and is no more than a smokescreen for £20 billion of cuts being driven through the NHS."

The tough criticism follows Prime Minister David Cameron's suggestion last week that there will be "real changes" to the Bill off the back of the consultation - a claim treated with suspicion by unions.

Mr Cameron said that hospital doctors and nurses would be made jointly responsible for commissioning £80bn of the NHS budget instead of just GPs.

He added that groups of GP consortia would take responsibility for commissioning "when ready," not by April 2013 as previously planned.

New "clinical senates" made up of senior medical professionals would be set up to oversee local integration of NHS services, while hospital regulator Monitor current duty to promote co-operation between services would only be broadened to "promote competition" when it was deemed of benefit to patients.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg is expected to reignite coalition tensions by claiming the changes as a victory for Liberal Democrats at a parliamentary party gathering.

But Unite said that his attempt to take the credit for winning big movement was a sideshow.

Ms Maskell said: "MPs, especially the Liberal Democrats, should put the founding principles of the NHS before narrow party advantage."

Shadow health secretary John Healey added that Mr Cameron hadalready broken a series of promises on the NHS and that his attempts to make fresh pledges fall short of scrapping the government's long-term desire to break up the NHS and introduce a full-scale market.

willstone@peoples-press.com