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Media Integrity > Published by Shamik Das, December 9th 2009 at 5:48 pm

EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending “hasn’t gone on nursing staff”

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The Sun has launched an unfounded attack on the Government’s record on the NHS. In an editorial last Friday they claimed that Labour’s increased investment in the health service “hasn’t gone on nursing staff” but “penpushers”.

This is simply wrong. According to the NHS Information Centre’s 1998-2008 Staff Overview report there have been an extra 270,000 staff – of which just 16,000 are new managers.

There have been:

• 39,000 extra doctors;
• 72,000 extra nurses;
• 18,000 extra therapists;
• 20,000 extra qualified scientists and technicians;
• 64,000 extra clinical support staff.

NHS-staff-increases-1998-2008

The other figures they quote, from a Conservative party Freedom of Information request on doctors on duty in A&E departments at night are irrelevant. The College of Emergency Medicine state that:

“Emergency Departments (ED) should have an Emergency Medicine (EM) Consultant on-call at all times”

It would be inefficient to have senior doctors sitting in empty rural emergency departments, as many of the ones cited by the paper are, but they are on hand if necessary. This is backed up by the standards from the college which outline the duties of an EM consultant:

“A significant proportion of this work will require the consultant to be present within ‘normal’ working hours, to enable engagement with other specialties and Trust management.

“An on-call EM consultant may return to the ED to provide direct senior clinical input into selected, serious cases as well as providing telephone advice on clinical, medico-legal and ethical issues.”

  • http://twitter.com/michaelkeighery/status/6503773025 Michael Keighery

    #dontbuythesun http://is.gd/5h2CU

  • http://twitter.com/gsdog7/status/6503803420 gsdog7

    RT @leftfootfwd: EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending under Labour “hasn’t gone on nursing staff”: http://is.gd/5h2CU

  • http://twitter.com/arlloyd/status/6503847588 Andy Lloyd

    RT @leftfootfwd: EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending under Labour “hasn’t gone on nursing staff”: http://is.gd/5h2CU

  • http://twitter.com/goodoldmj/status/6504715873 Martin Johnston

    RT @leftfootfwd: EXPOSED The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending under Labour “hasn’t gone on nursing staff”: http://is.gd/5h2CU dontbuyit!

  • http://twitter.com/dpoc41/status/6505188514 Dpoc41

    RT @leftfootfwd EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending under Labour “hasn’t gone on nursing staff”: http://is.gd/5h2CU

  • http://twitter.com/lamby316/status/6505299348 lee andrew

    EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending “hasn’t gone on nursing staff” http://bit.ly/5D3COQ

  • http://twitter.com/niknoks1912/status/6506555958 Nikki Butler

    RT @leftfootfwd The Sun’s false claims NHS spending under Labour “hasn’t gone on nursing staff” http://is.gd/5h2CU #dontbuythesun

  • http://twitter.com/tomsheppard/status/6512036019 Tom Sheppard

    EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending “hasn’t gone on nursing staff” http://tinyurl.com/ykfekee via @leftfootforward

  • http://billyblofeld.blogspot.com/ Billy Blofeld

    I don’t know if the figures are right or wrong, but who cares because The Sun has a fantastic front page tomorrow………. “Darling Just Screwed More People Than Tiger Woods”.

    You have to admire The Sun’s ability to get right to the heart of an issue.

  • http://twitter.com/paul0evans1/status/6514821907 Paul Evans

    Have a look? EXPOSED: The Sun’s false claims that NHS spending “hasn’t gone on nursing staff” http://url4.eu/uHoy

  • http://www.thethirdestate.net Reuben

    IMHO the distinction between good spending on nurses and doctors and bad spending on managers is a bit of a red herring. The fact that nurses and doctors have a direct and tangible role in actually fixing people seems to give rise to the utterly idiotic impression that they are who the only ones who add value. In reality the NHS is a massive organisation, continually faced with huge, important and difficult questions of resource allocation – amongst other things. Quite a few highly skilled ‘pen pushers’ might actually be a good thing.

  • Anon E Mouse

    Shamik – I probably wouldn’t have published this story. Who cares what The Sun says?

    Just heard the next Chancellor, George Osbourne, on Today and as he notes because of this governments insistence on taxing the majority of people in this country with their NI jobs tax, it appears the NHS will be the biggest contributor to the new rates in the UK.

    Thanks to New Labour we now have the NHS workers getting shafted to pay for the fiscal incompetence of this useless government.

  • Henry

    Hmmm, I wonder how many millions of people will get screwed if Boy George becomes Chancellor. You can be sure the Murdochs won’t care.

    I could never take the Sun seriously as the voice of the working class after I heard that the editor (now promoted upstairs) used to fly to Venice for Sunday lunch at a fancy restaurant. Talk about effete elitists.

  • Anon E Mouse

    Henry – Quite agree about hypocrisy – I remember Richard Littlejohn slapping down that awful Polly Toynbee, who it transpired, for all her hectoring and lecturing about global warming flew to her villa in Italy twice a month.

    And people wonder why the public are cynical about them…

  • http://twitter.com/mulberrybush/status/6561798454 diana smith

    exposing Sun's false claims about NHS spending http://tinyurl.com/ykfekee
    #cameronmyths

  • http://www.ubervu.com/conversations/www.leftfootforward.org/2009/12/exposed-the-suns-false-claims-that-nhs-spending-hasnt-gone-on-nursing-staff/ uberVU – social comments

    Social comments and analytics for this post…

    This post was mentioned on Twitter by mulberrybush: exposing Sun’s false claims about NHS spending http://tinyurl.com/ykfekee
    #cameronmyths…