May faces Cabinet mutiny over NHS funding
Five ministers will demand PM pledges £100m more each week or risk handing keys of No10 to Corbyn
THERESA MAY will be urged by five of her most senior ministers to commit an extra £100million per week to the NHS post-brexit with a row over domestic priorities likely to dominate tomorrow’s weekly Cabinet meeting.
Boris Johnson will lead the calls for the NHS to be put at the top of the Conservative agenda amid fears that Mrs May has already conceded the issue to Labour. Ministers have been told that housing, the environment and education are the Government’s three most important issues, but Mr Johnson and others will argue that neglecting the NHS will not only let patients down but will also hand Jeremy Corbyn the keys to Downing St.
Gavin Barwell, Mrs May’s chief of staff, is being blamed for persuading the Prime Minister that the NHS is a lost electoral cause after he showed Tory MPS a chart that put Labour well ahead on the issue.
It was drawn up from answers given by focus groups to questions about which parties they trusted most on key issues, and showed the NHS as La- bour’s strongest suit, while the Tories dominated on the economy, security and law and order.
The Foreign Secretary will use the meeting – at which the NHS winter crisis is the key item on the agenda – to tell Mrs May that it is “vital” the Government commits to more NHS funding.
He is expected to be backed by Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary; Chris Grayling, the Transport Secretary and Penny Mordaunt, the International Development Secretary, and Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary.
Mr Johnson famously claimed during the EU Referendum that Britain would be £350million per week better off after Brexit and that the money should be spent on the NHS.
That figure has been widely disputed, but he is understood to have been privately lobbying Mrs May for months to commit an extra £100million per week and has become “frustrated” at her failure to act.
Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader, said that rather than conceding the NHS to Labour as an electoral issue, the Government should be doing the opposite.
He said: “I don’t see why we should give up on the NHS given that we were ahead of Labour on it in 2010.
“This idea that people always think we can’t be trusted on the NHS is rubbish.
“People who voted Leave in the referendum voted on the basis that it would free up more money for the NHS and when you give your word on something you should stick to it.
“We know how much more money we will have, and when, so the Government should announce now that extra money will be given to the NHS from the day we stop paying in to the EU budget.”
An ally of Mr Johnson said: “Boris knows that if the Tories are going to beat Corbyn at the next general election it is vital that the Government commits to more NHS funding.
“He is concerned the Tories are surrendering the number one issue to Labour instead of proving that it is only the Conservatives that can deliver a properly-funded NHS,” the ally said.
In an interview last week Mr Johnson said: “As and when the cash becomes available – and it won’t until we leave [the EU] – the NHS should be at the very top of the list.”