There may be no NHS if Nigel Farage becomes prime minister, warns Wes Streeting
Wes Streeting has challenged Nigel Farage to outline health policies ahead of May’s local elections, warning that a Reform government in the UK could mean “there will be no NHS”.
The health secretary has called on the Reform UK leader to “explain” the party’s plans for the future of the NHS, amid concerns the party could move towards an insurance-based system.
Mr Streeting’s attack comes just weeks before crucial local elections in May, as Reform UK surges in national polls.
Speaking at an Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) event in London, the health secretary said the “question of whether this country should have a National Health Service” was a “fight in the making”.
Pointing to Mr Farage’s previous comments on NHS funding, he said: “When Nigel Farage announced his shadow cabinet he forgot to appoint a shadow health secretary.
“This may be because if Farage becomes prime minister there will be no NHS.
“Farage said, and I quote: ‘We’re going to have to move to an insurance-based healthcare system’. Just last year he said: ‘I don’t want this to be financed by general taxes. It doesn’t work’.”
The Reform UK leader has previously said the UK needs to “re-examine” its NHS funding model, and at the launch of Reform’s Wales manifesto last month he said he was “ready to consider any alternatives to the failure we are currently experiencing”.
In 2014 he said Britain would have to “move to an insurance-based healthcare system” but has since insisted he supports keeping healthcare free at the point of use.
Criticizing Reform England for not being clearer on health policies ahead of election day in May, Mr Streeting added: “Nigel Farage must stop keeping his guilty little secret, be honest with the British people about what he really believes and tell us what he will actually do.”
“What kind of insurance system will it bring? Social or private? Under what conditions? How much insurance premium will patients pay? What protections will be provided for the uninsured?”
He added: “If Reform want to form the next government they need to be honest with the British public and answer these questions.”
Turning to elections in Wales, where Reform UK is expected to make big gains, Mr Streeting said the thought of Farage’s victory would “give me chills”.
Reform England has topped opinion polls in Wales as well as Plaid Cymru, where Labor has been in power since the Senedd was established in 1999.
Meanwhile, Sir Keir Starmer is expected to suffer a devastating blow at the polls as Labor continues to lag behind in the polls, threatening to lose votes to both the Green Party on the left and Reform England on the right.
“For Farage to think he can do this without making it clear what he really believes in on the NHS would be the biggest con since Brexit, arguably bigger because at least he told us he believed in Brexit,” he said.
“You can’t trust this con man on the NHS. The best way for people in Wales to stop Reform and vote for the NHS is to support Welsh Labour.”
Reform UK has been contacted for comment.
