NHS funding rises

It has just been anounced that there will be a drop in the funding rises given to the NHS. It appears that since 2002 funding has been rising by 7% per year but in 2008 it will go down to 3.5% per year. The reality of this is the fact that those working in the NHS have failed to see the so called 7% rises in funding because 4 years on things are only getting worse. There should be some very hard questions being asked about where all this extra money has gone. It probably has been taken up by the growing amounts of money being paid out in primary care as well as changes in medical contracts, with the lesser part being used to fund Aganda for Change. It is a myth to believe that there has been a major expansion of NHS services over the last 4 years because the reality is a daily struggle against increasingly difficult problems. In effect this is an anouncement of a funding cut to the NHS and will come as no consolation to the large numbers of unemployed phyiotherapy graduates or qualified staff facing threats of redundancy. The Kings Fund seems to think that with good planning should be possible to avoid problems but at present the situation is one where financially solvent trusts are having to give up money to balance the books of overspent trusts so in the current NHS success or failure is not a matter of financial prudence but the whims of ministers and Department of Health managers.