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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Health Secretary Steve Barclay will today meet health experts as they seek to “mitigate winter pressures” hitting the NHS this year.

The pair will hold a roundtable with clinical leaders in Downing Street, aiming to “improve performance and drive forward planning” to ease the impact on the health service in the coming months – as well as discussing longer term problems, such as cutting waiting lists.

Mr Sunak said the government had “started planning for winter earlier than before”, adding: “We’re bringing together the best minds in healthcare who all have one shared aim – protecting patients and making sure they get the care they need this winter”.

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And Mr Barclay said he was “working closely with NHS and social care leaders to provide additional hospital capacity, protect emergency care and harness the full potential of technology to deliver the best possible service and intensify our efforts to tackle waiting lists”.

But while the event will be attended by NHS England’s chief executive Amanda Pritchard and numerous chairs of medical royal colleges, Labour attacked the government for failing to invite frontline staff.

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NHS strikes ‘hugely disruptive’

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said: “How can Rishi Sunak hold a summit to prepare for the winter crisis and forget to invite junior doctors and consultants?

“They are the people he most urgently needs to get around the table, to bring an end to these strikes.”

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Labour today claimed around 36,000 cancer appointments had been cancelled due to industrial action in the sector since December last year.

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting
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Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said doctors should be at the meeting.

And it criticised both Mr Sunak and Mr Barclay for refusing to meet with unions over their grievances with pay and conditions.

Mr Streeting added: “There were no national strikes in the NHS during 13 years of the last Labour government. If Rishi Sunak has given up on governing, he should call an election so Labour can restore the NHS to good health.”

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RWAs build mirrors where they need building blocks

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RWAs build mirrors where they need building blocks

RWAs build mirrors where they need building blocks

Most RWAs remain isolated and underutilized instead of composable, DeFi-ready building blocks. It’s time to change that.

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Collapsed crypto firm Ziglu faces $2.7M deficit amid special administration

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Collapsed crypto firm Ziglu faces .7M deficit amid special administration

Collapsed crypto firm Ziglu faces .7M deficit amid special administration

Thousands of savers face potential losses after a $2.7 million shortfall was discovered at Ziglu, a British crypto fintech that entered special administration.

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Heidi Alexander says ‘fairness’ will be government’s ‘guiding principle’ when it comes to taxes at next budget

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Heidi Alexander says 'fairness' will be government's 'guiding principle' when it comes to taxes at next budget

Another hint that tax rises are coming in this autumn’s budget has been given by a senior minister.

Speaking to Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander was asked if Sir Keir Starmer and the rest of the cabinet had discussed hiking taxes in the wake of the government’s failed welfare reforms, which were shot down by their own MPs.

Trevor Phillips asked specifically if tax rises were discussed among the cabinet last week – including on an away day on Friday.

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Tax increases were not discussed “directly”, Ms Alexander said, but ministers were “cognisant” of the challenges facing them.

Asked what this means, Ms Alexander added: “I think your viewers would be surprised if we didn’t recognise that at the budget, the chancellor will need to look at the OBR forecast that is given to her and will make decisions in line with the fiscal rules that she has set out.

“We made a commitment in our manifesto not to be putting up taxes on people on modest incomes, working people. We have stuck to that.”

Ms Alexander said she wouldn’t comment directly on taxes and the budget at this point, adding: “So, the chancellor will set her budget. I’m not going to sit in a TV studio today and speculate on what the contents of that budget might be.

“When it comes to taxation, fairness is going to be our guiding principle.”

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Afterwards, shadow home secretary Chris Philp told Phillips: “That sounds to me like a barely disguised reference to tax rises coming in the autumn.”

He then went on to repeat the Conservative attack lines that Labour are “crashing the economy”.

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Chris Philp also criticsed the government’s migration deal with France

Mr Philp then attacked the prime minister as “weak” for being unable to get his welfare reforms through the Commons.

Discussions about potential tax rises have come to the fore after the government had to gut its welfare reforms.

Sir Keir had wanted to change Personal Independence Payments (PIP), but a large Labour rebellion forced him to axe the changes.

With the savings from these proposed changes – around £5bn – already worked into the government’s sums, they will now need to find the money somewhere else.

The general belief is that this will take the form of tax rises, rather than spending cuts, with more money needed for military spending commitments, as well as other areas of priority for the government, such as the NHS.

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