NHS bureaucracy not the fault of EU

Geoffrey Brooking suggests that the government’s recent (and very welcome) announcement of a ‘bonfire of bureaucracy’ in the NHS is due to Brexit (Letters, February 25).

Except that the NHS bureaucracy is nothing to do with the EU, it is entirely ‘home grown,’ the regrettable result of three decades of Conservative and New Labour governments forcing the NHS - and other public services, like universities - to become more like businesses, via internal markets, cost-centres, and greater competition.

The consequence has been an increasing number of accountants, administrators, auditors, business managers, corporate compliance officers, media consultants, middle-managers, press officers, strategic coordinators, etc - but never enough doctors and nurses.

In turn, over-stretched frontline medical staff have been compelled to spend too much of their time on paperwork, form-filling, box-ticking and target-chasing, and preparing for the next external inspection, at the behest of governments and NHS managers who obsessively wanted to monitor and measure every activity, and have everything documented in minute detail.

How much time and money has this absurd Soviet-style regime wasted over the years, and how many brilliant medical staff have quit the NHS in sheer frustration and demoralisation?

Incidentally, Mr Brooking, ironic that you think cutting NHS bureaucracy is due to your beloved Brexit, when our fishermen, farmers and lorry drivers are facing catastrophic ruin due to Brexit red-tape!

I guess that from now on, any good news will be attributed to Brexit, and any bad news will be blamed on Brussels.

Such is the fantasy world inhabited by militant Brexiteers.

Pete Dorey Bath