Originally published @ 4:39 pm, Mon 4th Jan 2010
Amazing to hear David Cameron talking about extra money for the health service today, when he's set himself the target of bearing down on the public debt.
The Labour Party today published a report that shows that just by wanting to halve the public debt in 3 years instead of 4, the Tories would have to cut the spending plans by a further £26 billion.
Labour also publishes figures today that shows a gap in spending plans of £34 billion by the fifth year of a Tory Government based on their plans.
Cameron hopes it will be enough to call the report a lie, but having called for candour on Saturday, the least he could do is explain the main parts of his tax and spending plans so that Tory candidates don't promise things he can't deliver in his name.
For instance, Cameron was very clear today in saying he wanted to cut public spending in the next financial year (starting April) yet Tory councillors still don't seem to have realised that this means less money for their councils.
There's a fuller version of the web-page at http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2682/4244346789_c2b2a66d7d_b.jpg
Also slightly bewildering was the charge against targets within the NHS (unpopular and bureaucratic) with an assertion that new money would only go to the parts of the NHS serving the most needy, if they'd demonstrated that they could deliver. So rewards for meeting targets? Go figure.
As it happens, Labour is moving from top-down targets to guarantees that patients and the public can expect the NHS to deliver to, such as minimum times for operations and seeing cancer specialists.