Something New, Something Blue
HIP’s Westminster mole has uncovered a recent interview with Health Secretary Steven Barely from the podcast ‘Dying to Know’ with Laura Doomsberg’
Laura Doomsberg: I have with me today the Health Secretary Steven Barely. Welcome Secretary.
Steven Barely: Absolutely.
LD: Can I just start by clarifying an issue that many of our listeners really care about. Are you really building 40 completely “new hospitals,” as your party promised in your manifesto three years ago?
SB: I want to be absolutely clear about this. We made a pledge in our 2020 manifesto to modernise the NHS and that is very much in line with that aim.
LD: But is the government actually funding the building of 40 completely new hospitals?
SB: We are spending 20 billion on our programme and that is more than has ever been spent on an NHS modernisation programme. In the History of the British NHS. Of which we are proud. Rightly.
LD: So, is that 20 billion funding 40 new hospitals? Or just refurbishments of collapsing hospitals, such as the one at King’s Lynn?
SB: I am glad you asked me about King’s Lynn. I have been to that hospital and we are going to invest in improvements there and an entirely freshly painted maternity wing.
LD: But improving old hospitals is not the same thing as building 40 new hospitals, is it?
SB: Well, what the people of King’s Lynn will be wanting is an improved facility.
LD: But, putting King’s Lynn to one side, are you building 40 completely new hospitals? Or not?
SB: Well, I don’t think we can dismiss the interests of the people of King’s Lynn quite so lightly. And the same might be said of Huntingdon General, a hospital I have also visited.
LD: But a new bit on the side of an aged hospital is not a new hospital, as such, is it? Is it?
SB: Well, what the British people want is a hospital that is top of the range, a hospital for the twenty-first century, a hospital that treats the British people. Especially when they are ill.
LD: But Boris Johnson frequently said, and I quote, “we are building 40 new hospitals.” Rishi Sunak has said the same. I just want to know: have you started to build 40 new hospitals?
SB: Our programme is one of full spectrum medical overhaul and within that there is a commitment to envisaging 40 gleaming medical hospitals that we can all be proud of.
LB: But an envisaged hospital is not a real one, is it? Is it? So, how many have you actually started? I mean with bricks on the ground and that sort of building stuff.
SB: A brick leads to another brick and that is absolutely how hospitals are built. I cannot be clearer than that.
LD: But how many have you actually started?
SB: I don’t want to go down these rabbit holes with you Laura, but I can say that it is a number which can be added to other numbers to make 40 in the fullness of time, as we go forward, to deliver for the British people of Britain and their heritage. About which we are rightly proud. No matter what these woke people say.
LD: I am NOT being woke. I just want to know: how many fucking hospitals are you building?
SB: I think it was Winston Churchill who said that men, and women, are governed by their imaginations. And a hospital, indeed 40 hospitals, are absolutely imaginable.
LB: Just fuck off.
SB: Absolutely.
(Transcribed by Nick Pelling)
We hope you have enjoyed reading this article. The future of our volunteer led, non-profit publication would be far more secure with the aid of a small donation. You can also support local journalism by becoming a friend of HIP. It only takes a minute and we would be very grateful.
Leave a Reply