AS the Conservative leadership candidates continue with their "I'm more intolerant and inhumane than you are" contest in a bid to appeal to the intolerant and inhumane middle-class, elderly, white, male residents of the south of England who make up a disproportionately large part of the Conservative Party membership, an alarming report has been published by the influential think tank Radix UK. Its trustees include the former Conservative health secretary Andrew Lansley and the right-wing, sorry, ahem, “moderate” Labour MP Stephen Kinnock. 

The report, written by Professor Stephen Smith, the former chair of the East Kent acute hospital trust, suggests NHS England should tackle its funding crisis by charging hospital patients £8 for every day that they spend in hospital, that charges should also be introduced for equipment such as walking sticks or hearing aids, and that prescription charges should be introduced for patients over 60, who are currently exempt from the standard charge in England of £9.35 per item.

If, like me, you have a serious health condition, prescription charges soon mount up. I get eight different items per month on prescription, plus an additional two items less frequently. Thankfully here in Scotland they are all free, but if I lived in England I'd be paying £74.80 every month. That's a lot of money if you are on a low wage. 

Despite the fact that if introduced it would spell the end of the key principle of the NHS that healthcare should be free at the point of use, Professor Smith's report was approvingly discussed this morning on the far-right GB News – the favourite channel of the Conservative right which now dominates the party – as a means of solving the NHS funding crisis. Heaven forfend that the funding crisis should be tackled by increasing taxes on the large companies and wealthy individuals who have seen their income balloon in recent years. 

Once the principle of payment at the point of use is established, you can be certain that it would be the thin end of the wedge. Charges would only ever go upwards, and more and more things would be subject to charges. This would fall most heavily on low-income groups, who are most likely to suffer poor health and who would see a larger percentage of their already meagre income being eaten up by healthcare costs. 

Worryingly, it would also open the door to American-style big-pharma influence and creeping privatisation. In December 2021, then chancellor Rishi Sunak, currently one of the two Conservative leadership candidates, met with American private healthcare companies in California in a bid to encourage them to invest in the UK. One of the companies reportedly attending the meeting employs former prime minister David Cameron as an adviser.

Health is of course devolved to the Scottish Parliament, which is why I thankfully escape £74 monthly in prescription charges which someone with my health condition has to pay in England. However, if charging is introduced in NHS England, that would have a knock-on effect on the block grant which Westminster passes to Holyrood annually as part of a devolution settlement which ensures tight Westminster control of the purse strings. 

Additionally, as we have seen all too often in recent years, there is nothing to prevent a Conservative-controlled Westminster from deciding to overrule the Scottish Parliament. If this gives the Tories the chance to generate huge profits for their cronies, you can be certain that they would not hesitate to do so.

This piece is an extract from today’s REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug.

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