Bowel-cancer screening gets £60m funding

A bowel-cancer screening programme, which will cost £60m and could save more than 3,000 lives a year, has been announced by the Coalition Government.

The Department of Health is one of only two ministries to be protected from cuts and the Tory leadership is keen to demonstrate it is investing in vital services while making huge cuts elsewhere. The announcement is also designed to reassure the public about the plan to reorganise the NHS.

Around 1,200 additional specialists will be added to the health service in the next two years as part of a £164m cash injection to fight the disease. Another £50m will be made available to pay for life-extending drugs unavailable at the moment in Britain.

Radiotherapy treatment will also be increased, with £43m made available to treat patients overseas. It could eventually help 400 patients a year.

David Cameron said the extra funding was part of an effort to make Britain one of the world's leaders in cancer-survival rates.

"It is very important as we take the country through difficult decisions to say there are things that are so important to families, like my family, like the thousands of families watching this programme, that [we will improve them]," he told the BBC's The Andrew Marr Show.