UK health secretary accused of NHS cover-up

British Conservative Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt faces accusations of a politically motivated cover-up over his department’s refusal to release a damning report on the management of the National Health Service (NHS).

Critics said on Saturday that it is unacceptable that the report by former Marks & Spencer boss and Tory peer Stuart Rose is being kept from the public.

The NHS report was commissioned by Hunt a year ago and was completed last December, but the Department of Health has not released it to the public.

According to senior government officials, the Rose’s report strongly condemns NHS management and also suggests that the current Tory-led coalition government’s own reforms may have worsen the country’s health services.

Sarah Wollaston, the Tory Head of the health select committee, criticized the delay saying in her personal view the report, which was funded by British taxpayers should be published prior to the general elections set to be held in May.

“There is far too much of this going on, with uncomfortable information being withheld,” said Wollaston, adding, “Just as with the Chilcot report into the Iraq war, it is not right that reports paid for out of public money are not made available to the public on such vital issues as soon as possible, particularly ahead of a general election.”

Another critic Labour shadow health secretary, Andrew Burnham (pictured above), said the delay “looks for all the world like a politically motivated cover-up in advance of the general election,” adding, “If he wants to dispel or dismiss this suspicion, he must make arrangements to publish this report without delay.”

In response, the Department of Health said it had not set a publication date for the final report as its remit had suddenly been extended, claiming that the delay was made to add sections taking “into account the NHS’s own five-year forward view.”

This is while the author of the report, Rose, has earlier said to be frustrated that the report has been shelved until after the May poll. According to a recent report by the British daily the Financial Times, Rose had expressed dismay by what he had discovered during his investigations, describing the overall standard of NHS management to be “totally shocking.”

Under Prime Minister David Cameron’s coalition government, the NHS has suffered the longest period of funding restraint in its 66-year history, resulting in the layoff of over 7,000 NHS clinical staff members, including doctors and nurses.