The Conservative Party has pledged that the cost of bureaucracy in the NHS will be slashed by a third if it is elected to government, reports The Guardian.
The switch in spending priorities will transfer £1.5bn a year from backroom operations to frontline nurses and doctors, the shadow health secretary, Andrew Lansley, said.
No indication has been given of where the axe would fall but primary care trusts and assorted medical quangos are responsible for most of the NHS's annual administration costs of £4.5bn.
By the end of its fourth year in power, a Tory government aims to have reduced that annual figure to £3bn.
Addressing the Conservative conference in Manchester on 5 October 2009, Lansley said: "Labour have made expensive commitments on the NHS with no price tag. In contrast, we are determined to identify how we will save money before we spend it.
"To make the NHS successful we must devolve decision-making closer to patients. In doing so we'll save substantial sums of money. The NHS must be well managed but that's not expensive bureaucracy, it's about lean and good-quality management.
"Labour has allowed wasteful spending on bureaucracy to spiral. A Conservative government would cut it right back. We are determined to shift NHS funds from the back office to doctors and nurses on the front line. Our tough new approach will shift £1.5bn a year out to where it's needed most."
Health is one of only two departments for which the Tories have promised real terms spending increases. Reducing bureaucracy is presented as the means of achieving this funding goal.
At least £850m would be saved by returning NHS spending on administration to what it was six years ago. Back then, the Conservatives point out, Labour had already suggested there were potential savings of £750m to be made by slimming down bureaucracy costs.
Lansley claimed further savings can be made by scrapping "Labour's top-down process targets" while returning powers over budgets and out-of-hours care to GPs.
"Narrow" targets that focused only on part of a patient's treatment would be abolished, he promised, switching concerns instead to "overall results".
"This will mean that many of the administrative posts which exist simply to monitor progress against these targets will no longer be needed," a party briefing document explained.
Lansley endorsed an assessment by David Nicholson, the chief executive of the NHS, that savings of between £15-20bn need to be found between 2011-14. He said that the Tories will "go much further in slashing wasteful bureaucracy in the NHS hierarchy".
In his speech, Lansley repeated his pledge that "we are committed to real terms increases for the NHS in the next parliament".
He also promised "zero tolerance" of hospital acquired infections and the right for patients to choose not only the hospital where they are treated but also "which consultant will be responsible for your hospital treatment".
Determined to banish fears that a future Tory government would not look after the health service, he declared in the closing passage of his speech: "Conservatives – the party of the NHS."
If the British health service was as effective as those in the rest of the Europe, up to 100,000 extra lives a year could be saved, he told the conference.
"We will not make the people of this country pay for Labour's debt crisis by undermining their access to quality healthcare," he said.
