TALL TALES FROM YOUNG WALLACE…

Even though Andrew Marr was not in the chair after suffering a stroke, the show still went on and a couple of weeks ago the main guest Ed Miliband (young Wallace) was interviewed by BBCs James Langdale. 

During the interview, young Wallace was answering questions on the NHS and the question of nursing numbers once again raised its ugly head.

As you might expect, young Wallace claimed that thanks to the Coalition’s planned reorganisation of the NHS there were 4000 less nurses working in the Health Service than the previous year.

Now on its own that figure sounds dreadful. However it also reveals how practiced politicians manipulate statistics to add weight to their own political arguments.

What he didn’t say was this figure of 4000 was 9000 less than the number of nurses Labour announced was to be slashed if they had been re-elected in 2010. Official plans at the time showed that Labour Ministers were not planning to replace large numbers of staff who were to quit over the next five years. 

Had Labour been in charge, the number of qualified nurses would have slumped by 13,409 - after years of increases under Labour - By 2014, the total would fall from 329,372 in 2008 to 315,963. 

At the time, this revelation was a blow to Labour's election promise to protect frontline services while reining in public spending.

However, according to the latest NHS official figures, in 2011 the NHS employed 143,836 doctors, 370,327 qualified nursing staff, and 38,214 managers. There are also 1,788 more practice nurses employed by GPs in 2011 than ten years earlier.

This means that since Labour left office, 40,955 more nursing staff are working in today’s NHS!

There were 49,982 more NHS nurses in 2011 compared to ten years earlier, although there has been a drop over the last two years, where nurses leaving the service in various parts of the country have not always been replaced.

It’s also interesting to note that the overall NHS net expenditure has increased from £49.021 billion in 2001/02 to £104.333bn in 2011/12. The planned expenditure for 2012/13 is £108.897bn.

Sort of puts young Wallace’s statement back into context, doesn’t it?