The National Health ServiceHS and TTIP

I have received hundreds of emails requesting my position on the National Health Service (NHS) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). I explain my position below.

National Health Service

The creation of the NHS was one of the greatest achievements of any government in the 20th century. The Coalition Government's confusing and expensive reforms have done much to undermine our health service. The reforms have been overly bureaucratic and cost twice as much as they were supposed to.

My party would legislate to strengthen the NHS for the future and ensure it has time to care by:

– guaranteeing a GP appointment within 48 hours.

– providing thousands of new nurses and doctors.

– bringing physical care, mental health and social care into a single National Health Service that provides 'whole-person care', with a focus on prevention.

– giving mental health the priority status it deserves and enshrining the right to talking therapies in the NHS Constitution.

– ensuring that patients will wait no longer than one week for vital cancer tests and results by 2020.

NHS Ownership

It is becoming more and more evident that the market is not the answer to 21st century health and social care. A Labour government would repeal the Health and Social Care Act, which put the NHS on a fast track to privatisation and fragmentation, and reinstate the NHS as the preferred provider.

We would also allow patients and the public help design and decide any plans for changes to their local hospital services from the very start.

NHS Funding

My party has committed to raise £2.5 billion for an NHS Time to Care Fund. This will be secured by ensuring that hedge funds and tax avoiders play by the rules. We will also ask those at the top to pay more.

We will raise this extra money for the NHS by:

– clamping down on aggressive tax avoidance schemes.

– raising tax on high-value properties worth more than £2 million.

– introducing fees on tobacco companies so that they make a larger contribution towards the costs of tackling tobacco-related illness.

Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)

TTIP is an agreement being negotiated between the European Union and the United States that would remove trade barriers in a number of different economic sectors. Treaties can often lead to improved labour, consumer, environmental and safety standards.

TTIP: Public Services (including the NHS)

I take any threat to the quality of public services in this country very seriously. My party and I will withdraw our support for TTIP if safeguards are not inserted to protect our public services, and this includes the National Health Service.

TTIP: Investor-State Dispute Settlement

My party shares the public's concerns about the ISDS provisions, which have already become a major issue during these negotiations. My party has been calling for far greater transparency around an exclusion for legislation that is in the public interest.

In recent months, the European Commission has instigated several changes which have improved the transparency of the agreement, however the commission can and must go further. I will continue to monitor the progress of this agreement.