Speeches by Streeting.

“No, not necessarily. These are all subject to where we land in the 10-year plan. Do I believe fundamentally in more freedom and more flexibility for frontline system leaders and provider leaders? Absolutely. Do I think we need to make sure that that freedom comes with appropriate quality assurance and accountability? C…”

“In the sense of a Monitor?”

“And to provider organisations, and rationalising the regulatory landscape and making sure that we are measuring the right things in the right way, doing quality assurance and improvement in the right way. There is not just devolution of power to ICBs but more freedoms and flexibility closer to the frontline across the …”

“We want to devolve power, resources and responsibility from the centre and closer to the frontline, and indeed at the frontline. I can understand why, when we announced that NHS England would be abolished and rolled into the Department, there was a cautious welcome from some quarters, saying that they got the case on d…”

“That work is already well under way, as Jim Mackey has reported, and plans will be submitted and considered on their merits and viability. I have been very clear, right back to the NHS Providers’ speech that I gave towards the tail end of last year. We want ICBs to focus much more on strategic commissioning and making …”

“Certainly the draft, yes, but it is not only subject to internal kicking of the tyres; I also need to take it to colleagues across government, not least the Prime Minister, to make sure that they are happy with it. Yes, I am very clear about where we are going with the 10-year health plan.”

“That is what we are going at. Those are the plans that will be coming in. We will look at the plans that come in on their merits.”

“It was about reducing duplication and inefficiency, bringing the NHS under financial control and making sure that we have the right spend in the right places, which is closer to the frontline.”

“Because we are going after waste, duplication and inefficiency. If we are asking ICBs to focus on strategic commissioning, by definition that also means asking them to stop the duplication, which I think has been allowed to build up unnecessarily and avoidably.”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“It is subject to discussion with Treasury, whose servant I am.”

“We will not know the numbers until we have confirmed the ultimate size and shape of the organisation, the impact of the headcount and how much it will cost to treat fairly people whose jobs are at risk and may not be carried forward. However, that is not an unreasonable ballpark figure. I justify that cost on the basis…”

“A couple of things: first—and this is not a criticism of your question, by the way—it makes my blood boil when people say, “Oh, but it is only hundreds of millions of pounds of savings. Is it really worth it?” I think that one of the cultural problems with the NHS and a Department that has a budget of the size it has—n…”

“That is exactly the right framework and is exactly how we are thinking. If we can free up hundreds of millions of pounds and deploy that resource to the frontline, investing in more frontline staff, and making sure we have the right care in the right places at the right time, we will deliver not only better care for pa…”

“In what sense?”

“Yes. And we have been very clear that we want to reduce the size of the centre by 50%. I am not so dogmatic that if we ended up with just below or above 50%, I would feel we had failed. However, that direction is important. It is also important in the context of financial savings. I make no bones about that. One of the…”

“We know that there is duplication across NHS England and the Department. We have taken a few things into account. One is where we think there are duplications of function. Secondly, we intend to devolve more power and responsibility and therefore, in the spirit of what I said to NHS Providers, if you are giving power a…”

“I am tempted to suggest that you should invite my predecessors to account for that episode. However, I think there were a number of reasons. Thinking about the two organisations, there has been a lot of what I would call man-marking going on between the Department and NHS England. For example, there are two elective te…”

“Bearing in mind that there will be people working in these teams, I do not want any examples I give to be seen as a reflection on the quality of their work or their dedication to their jobs. That is not the case. However, there are some obvious examples. There are two HR departments, two finance departments and two com…”