Further opposition to the government’s disastrous health and social care bill emerged this week. The British Medical Journal, the Health Service Journal and the Nursing Times joined thousands of doctors and nurses calling for the bill to be dropped. They say the NHS is ‘far too important to be left at the mercy of ideological and incompetent interventions.’ I agree.

But despite the widespread fear about the impact of the biggest reorganisation in the history of the NHS, the government carries on regardless.

Desperate to get the bill through parliament, the government tabled a further 136 amendments to it on Wednesday night, adding to the 1,800 already tabled. In the Commons, I asked whether the prime minister himself now knows what is going on with the health bill. I called on the leader of the House to find time for an urgent debate on the NHS to give the PM the opportunity to inform himself on what the government is actually doing and the health secretary the opportunity to come to the House and announce he has finally seen reason and will abandon the plan immediately.

The reality of a Tory-led administration was laid bear in the Commons this week when the government voted to cut support for disabled children, cut support for people recovering from cancer and voted for a crude cap that even the secretary of state for local government says will increase homelessness. Of course tough decisions are needed to get the deficit down, but these cuts to welfare support offer a stark reminder of the difference between Labour and a Tory government. At Business Questions on Thursday, I asked the Leader of the House to find time for a debate on fairness to give ministers the opportunity to explain why they are cutting support for those who have the least.

On the subject of fairness, figures released this week reveal that there has been an almost 10 per cent drop in university applicants since the government tripled student fees. At the same time, the government has signed off a tax wheeze for the chief executive of the Student Loan Company which saves him tens of thousands of pounds a year. I asked the leader of the House to explain how that is fair.

At Business Questions, I also asked ministers to explain how it is fair that the government did nothing to stop the chief executive of RBS taking a million pound bonus. Instead it took the threat of a motion from Labour to stop it.
I suggested that the deputy prime minister could lead a fairness debate because there’s been no sign of him in public to explain why the Liberal Democrats have done nothing to stop bankers awarding themselves multi-million pound bonuses but voted to cut support for those who have the least.

——————————————————————————–

Angela Eagle is MP for Wallasey and shadow leader of the Commons