PM announces £140 million NHS fund to help cut bureaucracy for nurses

Prime Minister, David Cameron, has declared that he wants to build on the “real successes in the NHS” with the announcement of £140 million in funding to ease the burden of red tape on nurses and midwives, giving them the opportunity to spend more time with their patients.

As Conservative activists begin gathering in Birmingham for the party’s annual conference, which begins on Sunday, the Prime Minister also pledged additional cash to ensure cancer patients have access to advanced radiotherapy treatment.

Cameron’s new announcements came as he paid a visit to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, where he addressed some of the changes his party has made since he became leader. This includes £100 million for the latest software and other devices to be used by NHS nurses and midwives in England. This will cut the time spent on form-filling and management processes like rotas, giving them more time spent interacting with patients.

Cameron declared: “What we’re announcing is £100 million extra into the NHS specifically to help our brilliant nurses with new technology, so they can spend even more time at the bedside with their patients.”

He added: “We’re only able to do this because we’re the only party, the only people, who said ‘whatever else we have to do, whatever other cuts we have to make, we are not cutting the NHS budget, we’re increasing it.’ That was my pledge, that’s what we are doing.”

The money will initially be made available in the form of loans, although hospitals will only have to pay back a proportion depending on how well they perform according to feedback from patients and the general public.

There is a further £40 million to help ward sisters and community team leaders develop their leadership skills, with training and support for 1,000 staff this year, rising to 10,000 over the next two years.

Cameron also announced a £15 million cancer radiotherapy innovation fund, with a guarantee that from next April, all cancer patients will have access to the most innovative, clinically appropriate and cost-effective radiotherapy.

Zanib Asghar