PRIVATE SECTOR MANAGEMENT OF NHS TRUSTS

That this House notes the Government's vision document, Developing the NHS Performance Regime, which includes provisions allowing private sector management to take over NHS trusts that are deemed to have failed by the NHS Chief Executive; does not believe that NHS performance will be improved by diverting money out of the NHS into corporate profits; deplores the apparent underlying assumption that the private sector is always superior; observes that the current global economic crisis was caused by the greed and incompetence displayed in equal measure by many of the world's largest private sector institutions; hopes the level of management expertise that brought Northern Rock to its knees and Terminal Five to a standstill will not now be unleashed on our hospitals; urges the Government to reaffirm the value of the public sector ethos; and hopes that Ministers will improve their own performance by ditching their apparent knee-jerk impulse to privatise whenever faced with a policy decision.