LUKE MARSDEN: for all its faults, we must fight for the future of the NHS

We love it so much that in 2020 we clapped for it every Thursday night on our doorsteps.

This week the NHS turned 75. It’s Europe’s largest employer with over a million staff, each playing a role contributing to the service we receive.

The NHS is very close to my heart as both my mum and sister are NHS nurses. I cannot express enough how proud of them I am. However, like anything, the NHS is not infallible. Far from it: in large parts it’s a busted flush.

Understandably we don’t like to hear criticism, but it is riddled with problems, stemming from government failings, woke ideologies perculating across the regions and, on a local trust level, total and utter mismanagement by CEOs.

If the NHS was a private business, not only would we have seen mass redundancies long ago, we could possibly have seen total liquidation.

How do you fix a problem like the NHS? Tens of billions a year of our tax money is thrown into it. The largest criticism of a Conservative government is that it does not fund the NHS properly.

That is untrue, in fact, the largest amount of money ever is currently being poured into the service.

Speaking to friends who work alongside my family, it’s stark that we are being failed by the so-called "managers” who, if this was an adoption service, would’ve had the children taken off them by now.

Millions of our tax money are squandered on vanity projects, services people don’t want or need and tick-box training courses.

The NHS waiting list is soaring and many beds are occupied by folk abusing a system they haven’t contributed towards.

I love our National Health Service, I want it to thrive. In another 75 years I won’t be here but I sincerely hope the NHS is!