Northerner
Admin (Retired)
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
A riddle
The Health Secretary, his Labour shadow and the Chair of the UK Statistics Authority walk into a pub. They start discussing the NHS budget.
After ordering a round of shandies, talk turns to the health service budget. Jeremy Hunt says, "real-terms spending on the NHS has increased across the country."
Then Andy Burnham protests: "he has cut the NHS budget for two years running and he owes it to patients and NHS staff to be honest about that. He can?t manipulate the statistics and expect to get away with it."
The Labour MP then turns to Andrew Dilnot, the Chair of the UK Statistics Authority, and asks him to back him up.
At first Mr Dilnot appears to support Mr Burnham's take on the numbers: "Expenditure on the NHS in real terms was lower in 2011-12 than it was in 2009-10". But then he adds, "it might also be fair to say that real terms expenditure has changed little over this period."
As far as we know, this little assembly in the Red Lion never took place. However Mr Hunt and Mr Burnham have nevertheless been involved in a very public war of words over the NHS budget, and Mr Dilnot has found himself in the middle of it.
http://fullfact.org/articles/NHS_budget_health_spending_statistics-28697
The Health Secretary, his Labour shadow and the Chair of the UK Statistics Authority walk into a pub. They start discussing the NHS budget.
After ordering a round of shandies, talk turns to the health service budget. Jeremy Hunt says, "real-terms spending on the NHS has increased across the country."
Then Andy Burnham protests: "he has cut the NHS budget for two years running and he owes it to patients and NHS staff to be honest about that. He can?t manipulate the statistics and expect to get away with it."
The Labour MP then turns to Andrew Dilnot, the Chair of the UK Statistics Authority, and asks him to back him up.
At first Mr Dilnot appears to support Mr Burnham's take on the numbers: "Expenditure on the NHS in real terms was lower in 2011-12 than it was in 2009-10". But then he adds, "it might also be fair to say that real terms expenditure has changed little over this period."
As far as we know, this little assembly in the Red Lion never took place. However Mr Hunt and Mr Burnham have nevertheless been involved in a very public war of words over the NHS budget, and Mr Dilnot has found himself in the middle of it.
http://fullfact.org/articles/NHS_budget_health_spending_statistics-28697