Bottomley defends NHS reform to outflank her Anglican critics

wrong''.

She was speaking out after she had written to the Archbishop of

Canterbury, Dr George Carey, setting out ''the purpose behind the

Government's health reforms''.

Mrs Bottomley, interviewed yesterday on BBC1's Breakfast With Frost,

said: ''The health service is not a business. It is not for profit. It

is not for sale. It is about improving the health of the nation.''

She stressed the need to measure what was being done in the NHS so

that improvements could be made each year.

The Bishop of Birmingham, Dr Mark Santer, had said in a sermon two

weeks ago that the market system introduced into the NHS had resulted in

a ''system in distress'' and had reduced the patient to the status of a

unit of consumption and exchange.

But before her appearance on TV yesterday Mrs Bottomley issued a

statement insisting: ''It is misconceived and misjudged to attack the

NHS reforms as un-Christian. The values of compassion and caring and of

professional pride and public service are the life-blood of the NHS.

''But it is fantasy policy to believe that the NHS does not also have

to be concerned with cost and value for money.''

She added: ''Inside the NHS, there is a growing recognition that these

two sets of goals, far from being incompatible, are mutually

reinforcing. I hope that others will recognise this too.''

Responding to the statement, the Bishop emphasised that he had never

called the reforms un-Christian.

''I acknowledge the need for change. I explicitly recognised the

importance of financial responsibility and accountability. I also

recognised the problem of conflicting claims on limited resources,'' he

said.

''The question is how do we decide between these claims? My argument

is that the mechanisms of the 'market' are not adequate for settling

dilemmas which in the end are not solely financial but moral.''

Mrs Bottomley told Breakfast With Frost she needed measures of what

was happening in the NHS ''to make sure that our commitment is not just

rhetoric -- it is actually happening in practice.

''The public service ethos of the health service is formidable. But we

do need to measure what we are doing to make sure we improve what we are

doing each year.''

She continued: ''My job is to strike a balance between the interests

of patients -- that must come first -- and the interests of the people

who work in the service and the taxpayer.''

Commenting on a recent Organisation for Economic Co-operation and

Development report praising the NHS reforms, she added: ''There is no

place for deriding economists. What they are saying is that the reforms

are increasing the efficiency of the service.''

In her letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Mrs Bottomley declared:

''The NHS is not a business. The only profit it makes is to be measured

in the cure of illness, the care of the vulnerable, the relief of pain,

and its contribution to a healthier nation.

''We are all its shareholders, but our interest is human, not

financial. The test which we must apply to the NHS is the experience of

patients themselves and their families.''

This was not to say that the NHS could not learn from the private

sector in some of its activities.

''The fact that one million more patients are treated in hospital than

before the reforms is an important achievement and one which does credit

to NHS staff,'' she added.

* The Shadow Health Secretary, Mr David Blunkett, pledged yesterday to

campaign for free dental check-ups and free eye-tests to be included in

Labour's General Election manifesto.

But he told GMTV's Sunday Best programme that these policies had to be

agreed through various processes in the Labour movement.

''This is not a policy made by an individual just because it happens

to suit me,'' he said.

He also lashed out at the way the Government was developing the

National Health Service.

''We want none of the commercialisation and privatisation. We want

none of the competitition and internal market. We want a caring

service,'' he said.

Mr Blunkett added that the biggest challenge facing the NHS was caring

for the growing elderly population. ''We have a Government that promised

that people would be able to inherit wealth from passing property from

one generation to another.

''We find the very opposite. People are having to sell their homes to

pay for care in private residential homes.''

Mr Blunkett said Labour would consider switching some of the #2500m of

public funds currently being used to pay for people in private nursing

and residential homes to the health service.