Labour and the NHS

It would appear that the Labour governments' NHS now charges some patients 40p per minute to call their GP.

Do you remember the 1997 Labour manifesto?

"if the Conservatives are elected again there may well not be an NHS in five years' time - neither national nor comprehensive. Labour commits itself anew to the historic principle: that if you are ill or injured there will be a national health service there to help; and access to it will be based on need and need alone - not on your ability to pay, or on who your GP happens to be or on where you live."

I could find no mention of allowing GPs to use 0845 numbers to raise money for their practices.

What I could find were these promises that seem somewhat humorous in the light of what this Labour government has done to the NHS since 1997.

"Management will be held to account for performance levels. Boards will become more representative of the local communities they serve. A new patients' charter will concentrate on the quality and success of treatment. The Tories' so-called 'Efficiency Index' counts the number of patient 'episodes', not the quality or success of treatment. With Labour, the measure will be quality of outcome, itself an incentive for effectiveness. As part of our concern to ensure quality, we will work towards the elimination of mixed-sex wards."

" Labour is opposed to the privatisation of clinical services which is being actively promoted by the Conservatives."

"The Conservatives have wasted spending on the NHS. We will do better. We will raise spending on the NHS in real terms every year and put the money towards patient care. And a greater proportion of every pound spent will go on patient care not bureaucracy."
Does anyone know if the Labour government have kept this promise?

"Our fundamental purpose is simple but hugely important: to restore the NHS as a public service working co-operatively for patients, not a commercial business driven by competition."