• Cancer in the UK report: progress in fighting disease must be “celebrated” but “cannot become complacent”
• Interim Water Commission: cleaning up water industry will “take more than a hose down”
• Govt needs to bite the bullet and put Thames Water into special administration
• Health and social care services face £200 million overspend

Cancer in the UK report: progress in fighting disease must be “celebrated” but “cannot become complacent”

Responding to the Cancer Research UK’s Cancer in the UK report, Liberal Democrat Health and Social Care spokesperson Helen Morgan MP said:

The progress that we have made in fighting cancer in recent decades must be celebrated, but we cannot become complacent. There is still so much more we need to do.

We are seeing waiting times grow longer and the rate of early diagnosis stall, all of which could see us squander these years of progress that have given many people the chance to live long and healthy lives.

To do that, we need to see the Government show real ambition in rebuilding cancer services by investing in more radiology machines and rapidly expanding the number of cancer nurses.

That needs to lead us to a point where patients have a legal right to start their treatment within two months of an urgent referral so they can get the care they deserve and potentially save thousands of lives.

Interim Water Commission: cleaning up water industry will “take more than a hose down”

Responding to Sir John Cunliffe’s interim water commission report, Tim Farron MP, Liberal Democrat Environment Spokesperson, said:

This report makes it painfully clear that water companies can pollute and make profit with impunity – all at customers’ expense. At the heart of the sewage scandal is a regulatory system which has failed.

It’s going to take more than a hose down to clean up the water industry. It’s time for Ofwat to go and the Commission must now make this plain.

If Ofwat remains in name or nature, the government will have failed in their aims to improve our waterways and address public outrage with serious regulatory reform.

Liberal Democrats will continue our campaign to replace Ofwat with a new regulator to clean up our waterways for good.

Govt needs to bite the bullet and put Thames Water into special administration

Commenting to the news that KKR has pulled out of plans to buy Thames Water, Liberal Democrat MP Charlie Maynard, who has previously appealed Thames Water’s £3bn bailout said:

The buyer for Thames Water has walked away. The company is now at the end of the road. The Government needs to bite the bullet, and put Thames Water into Special Administration, so its unsustainable debt can be written down and the interests of Thames Waters 16 million customers can be protected.

While Thames Water is being allowed to keep piling up more and more debt, customers are paying the price in massive interest payments. This is totally unfair. The creditors who have heaped billions in debt onto the company should now pay to sort this mess out. This can only be achieved through a well planned administration process, followed by a swift exit – after which the company should go forward being mutually owned by its 16 million customers.

Health and social care services face £200 million overspend

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has today revealed that Health and Social Care partnerships were predicting that they would overspend by more than £200 million in the 2024-25 financial year.

Analysis of documents, including board minutes and financial planning docs, published by Health and Social Care Partnerships reveal that in recent months:

• Fife topped the list with the largest projected deficit of £35.4 million.
• This was followed by Dumfries & Galloway (£21 million), Edinburgh (£20.2 million) and Glasgow City (£17.5 million). Several partnerships have brought forward proposed savings to deal with the projected deficits.
• Edinburgh attributed its deficit to slippage in delivery of savings schemes and the increasing cost of prescription drugs.
• Dundee warned that if the IJB were to utilise the £4.689m in their General Reserves, it would leave the residual reserve balance at only £27,000 at end of financial year

Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP said:

Scotland’s health and care boards are facing severe financial challenges.

These deficits are obviously changing regularly but it’s clear that health and care services are under immense pressure.

Health bosses are facing tough decisions about how to balance the books.

The gap between the services we want and the services that the health service can provide seems to be getting wider and wider. Unfortunately so far there seems to be little acknowledgement of the problem from the SNP. Instead we have had a succession of health secretaries who deliver warm words but little action.

You can’t wave a wand and get our health and care services back on track. There needs to be considerable upfront investment in diagnostic tests, staffing and preventative care to reduce the burden on both NHS and care services.