‘Household tax bills need to rise by £2,000 to save NHS’

FAMILIES could be forced to pay an extra £2,000 a year in tax to save the NHS, economists warned last night.

In a major report, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said tax will have to rise if the Health Service is to have any hope of meeting its waiting time targets.

The economists said that merely to maintain provision at current levels, spending on healthcare will have to rise by an average 3.3 per cent a year above inflation over the next 15 years.

This is because of the ageing population, rising levels of complex illnesses and the increasing costs of drugs.

But in order to get the NHS back on track with currently missed targets, funding increases of per cent a year above inflation would be required – with 5 per cent increases in the shortrun to address current crises. The IFS said that would require taxes to rise by between 1.6 and 2.6 per cent of GDP, the equivalent of between £1,200 and £2,000 per household.

The huge hike, which could be phased in by 2033/3 , would take health spending to almost 10 per cent of national income, up from 7.3 per cent today.

The report, joint authored with the Health Foundation think tank, pointed out that Britain’s health service is chronically underfunded compared to our continental neighbours.

For example, despite the fact there has been a 70 per cent increase in the number of hospital doctors over the past 20 years, we still have fewer doctors per head of population than any country in western Europe.

Paul Johnson, director of IFS and an author of the report, said: ‘If we are to have a health and social care system which meets our needs and aspirations, we will have to pay a lot more for it over the next 15 years.

‘This time we won’t be able to rely on cutting spending elsewhere – we will have to pay more in tax. But it is a choice: higher taxes and a health and social care system which meets our expectations and improves over time, or taxes at current levels and a more constrained health service delivering less than we have become accustomed to.’

It was claimed last night that Theresa May was planning to announce a huge budget boost for the NHS as soon as next month. The Spectator magazine said she would use the 70th anniversary of the creation of the Health Service to increase its spending by £350million a week – the amount promised by the Leave campaign during the referendum campaign – by the time of the election.

However a Whitehall source said the report was inaccurate.