The Health Secretary tells Sky News her aim is to move people out of hospital more quickly to free up capacity.
The difficulty is that if Party unity is made the great imperative above everything else then the Government loses any sense of direction. The status quo is continued by default.
The Government may be looking ahead to another winter of mild disruption, lengthening waiting lists, and protracted negotiations. Nonetheless, the prognosis is not half as gloomy as this time last year.
Our chosen model is grossly unjust and will have many horrible consequences. But it already has, and yet it ticks along, because those consequences are not evenly spread.
Monday’s speech and today’s announcement show them choosing their ground for the next election. And since Hunt may find no money for further tax cuts next spring, the option of a May general election is opening up.
We hurl abuse at here-today-gone-tomorrow politicians and their advisers, while the permanent state flourishes like a green bay tree.
Did those in power still believe it was right to terrify the nation into submissions with their fear-mongering campaigns warning us to stay away from our loved ones? And why did the rules constantly change and at very little notice?
Without swift action, antimicrobial resistance (AMR) could end modern medicine as we know it. This would have a devastating impact on patients and their families and carers, the NHS, the economy and on global health security.
“We’re not in the business of damaging people’s privacy”, Michelle Donelan tells the BBC.
This perhaps reflects the fact that with the Speech happening on 7th November, there will be little actual time for legislation in the final session of Parliament in any case.
Though for all his efforts to place his tanks on Tory lawns, the former editor of Socialist Alternatives still struggled to speak like a Conservative in several crucial areas.
On education, high speed rail and smoking, he will allow our country to pursue an ambitious and optimistic future for people, whoever they are and wherever they come from.
A new body, modelled on the Serious Fraud Office, is needed to independently and expertly investigate allegations of criminal wrongdoing against medical professionals and institutions.