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'If I'd waited five hours to see a doctor, I'd be dead': Theresa May faces personal challenge from Andrew Marr in live BBC interview

Prime Minister tells broadcaster, who survived a stroke in January 2013, NHS is better prepared for winter but admits 'nothing is perfect and there is more to do'

Alex Matthews-King

Health Correspondent

Sunday 07 January 2018 14:19 GMT

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Andrew Marr tells Theresa May he would not have survived his stroke in many NHS hospitals today

Andrew Marr has told Theresa May that he would not be alive today if he had suffered the kind of ambulance delays and A&E waits being seen in the NHS this winter, in a personal challenge to the Prime Minister during a live BBC interview.

The veteran broadcaster, who suffered a stroke in January 2013, recounted the case of Leah Butler-Smith whose mother waited five hours to be seen after a stroke this week.

Challenging Mrs May’s repeated claims that the NHS is better prepared and funded for this winter than any other, he said: “If I’d been waiting for five hours before I’d seen a doctor after my stroke, I would not be here talking to you.

“This is about life and death, and up and down the country people are having horrendous experiences of the NHS.”

“Whether you say there’s a plan, or not, there’s a real problem.”

The Prime Minister said she could not comment on the case of Ms Butler-Smith but insisted the NHS was performing better and seeing more people within the four-hour target than a few years ago.

However, the she conceded “nothing is perfect” and said more could be done to improve performance.

Earlier this week, Ms Butler-Smith posted a video of a queue of ambulances outside a hospital in Chelmsford, Essex, explaining that her mother had had a stroke, but was currently tenth in a queue to get into hospital.

After waiting an hour in the ambulance they faced a further four-hour wait to be seen by a doctor.

It came as official NHS figures showed nearly 17,000 patients were delayed more than half an hour in the back of an ambulance over Christmas because hospitals simply do not have the capacity to take in more patients.

Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

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1/6Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

The elderly

“We acknowledge that there are pressures on the health service, there are always extra pressures on the NHS in the winter, but we have the added pressures of the ageing population and the growing complex needs of the population,” Theresa May has said. Waits of over 12 hours in A&E among elderly people have more than doubled in two years, according to figures from NHS Digital.

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Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

Patients going to A&E instead of seeing their GPs

Jeremy Hunt has called for a “honest discussion with the public about the purpose of A&E departments”, saying that around a third of A&E patients were in hospital unnecessarily. Mr Hunt told Radio 4’s Today programme the NHS now had more doctors, nurses and funding than ever, but explained what he called “very serious problems at some hospitals” by suggesting pressures were increasing in part because people are going to A&Es when they should not. He urged patients to visit their GP for non-emergency illnesses, outlined plans to release time for family doctors to support urgent care work, and said the NHS will soon be able to deliver seven-day access to a GP from 8am to 8pm. But doctors struggling amid a GP recruitment crisis said Mr Hunt’s plans were unrealistic and demanded the Government commit to investing in all areas of the overstretched health service.

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Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

Simon Stevens, head of NHS England

Reports that “key members” of Ms May’s team used internal meetings to accuse Simon Stevens, head of NHS England, of being unenthusiastic and unresponsive have been rejected by Downing Street. Mr Stevens had allegedly rejected claims made by Ms May that the NHS had been given more funding than required.

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Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

Previous health policy, not funding

In an interview with Sky News’s Sophy Ridge, Ms May acknowledged the NHS faced pressures but said it was a problem that had been “ducked by government over the years”. She refuted the claim that hospitals were tackling a “humanitarian crisis” and said health funding was at record levels. “We asked the NHS a while back to set out what it needed over the next five years in terms of its plan for the future and the funding that it would need,” said the Prime Minister. “They did that, we gave them that funding, in fact we gave them more funding than they required… Funding is now at record levels for the NHS, more money has been going in.” But doctors accused Ms May of being “in denial” about how the lack of additional funding provided for health and social care were behind a spiralling crisis in NHS hospitals.

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Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

Target to treat all A&E patients within four hours

Mr Hunt was accused of watering down the flagship target to treat all A&E patients within four hours. The Health Secretary told MPs the promise – introduced by Tony Blair’s government in 2000 – should only be for “those who actually need it”. Amid jeers in the Commons, Mr Hunt said only four other countries pledged to treat all patients within a similar timeframe and all had “less stringent” rules. But Ms May has now said the Government will stand by the four-hour target for A&E, which says 95 per cent of patients must be dealt with within that time frame.

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Everyone the Government blames for the NHS crisis – except themselves

No one

Mr Hunt was accused of “hiding” from the public eye following news of the Red Cross’s comments and didn’t make an official statement for two days. He was also filmed refusing to answer questions from journalists who pursued him down the street yesterday to ask whether he planned to scrap the four-hour A&E waiting time target. Sky News reporter Beth Rigby pressed the Health Secretary on his position on the matter, saying “the public will want to know, Mr Hunt”. “Sorry Beth, I’ve answered questions about this already,” replied Mr Hunt. “But you didn’t answer questions on this. You said it was over-interpreted in the House of Commons and you didn’t want to water it down. Is that what you’re saying?” said Ms Rigby. “It’s very difficult, because how are we going to explain to the public what your intention is, when you change your position and then won’t answer the question, Mr Hunt”. But the Health Secretary maintained his silence until he reached his car and got in.

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The Prime Minister said: “I recognise that people have concerns if they have an experience of that sort.

“If we look at what is happening across the NHS, we see it is delivering for more people.

“It is treating more people, and more people are being seen within the four hours every day – when compared to a few years ago. But nothing is perfect and there is more for us to do.”

Figures, released by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, show that performance against the target of treating 95 per cent of patients within four hours of them attending A&E had plummeted.

In the first week of November, 86 per cent of NHS trusts were hitting the four-hour target, which was last met nationally in 2015.

But in the last week of December that plummeted to 75 per cent, with 46 out of 54 hospitals measured reporting worse performance.

In the wake of the Autumn Budget awarding the NHS less than half of the extra funding it had asked for, health service chiefs warned that patients should expect longer waits as a result.

Jonathan Ashworth MP, Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, said: “Yet again Theresa May has shown utter disregard for those patients languishing on trolleys, delayed in ambulances in the freezing cold weather or forced to wait longer in pain and anxiety because their operation has been cancelled.”

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