Half of hospitals delay surgery to save cash

Almost half of NHS hospitals across England are now deliberately delaying operations to save money, according to a Sunday Telegraph today.

"Minimum waiting times" have been imposed by at least 43% of Acute NHS Trusts, a survey for Channel 4's Dispatches programme found. Treatments are often postponed for more than 20 weeks, despite staff and equipment being available.

The survey shows that "minimum waiting times" are, in some hospitals, approaching 28 weeks - the government's much-vaunted maximum wait for in-patient treatment.

The delays were described as "unnecessary" and "crazy" by James Johnson, the chairman of the British Medical Association.

The latest accounts, released last week, show an NHS deficit of £1.3 billion in the third quarter of this financial year, up from £1.2 billion during the previous thee months.

During the same period, the proportion of primary care trusts in the red rose from 39 to 47%.

When are the government going to stop wasting such vast amounts on the EU, pay off these NHS deficits with the money saved, and achieve much more still with the remaining multi-billion pound annual saving?

It's quite simply a 'no brainer'. It's perfectly possible for European countries to co-operate together on the issues that affect us all, without paying huge amounts of money into a central, very leaky EU budget - at the expense of essential public services.