NHS Bill-It must be stopped before it is too late

In what must be seen as a major blow to the government and in particular the beleaguered health secretary Andrew Lansley,the influential Tory blog Conservative Home has come out against the NHS bill describing it as not just a distraction but potentially fatal to the Conservative Party's electoral prospects.

Editor Tim Montgomerie writes that:

The NHS was long the Conservative Party’s Achilles heel. David Cameron’s greatest political achievement as Leader of the Opposition was to neutralise health as an issue. The greatest mistake of his time as Prime Minister has been to put it back at the centre of political debate.

and continues

Following a week in which it has been reported that certain members of the cabinet reputedly wanted him taken out and shot and despite wholesale support during angry PMQ clashed,this must surely be another massive blow for Lansley,for it is certain that certain members of the Tory hierarchy are behind the article.

As Montgomerie adds

Andrew Lansley will have to move on. He will have to move on because he hasn’t been able to communicate these reforms in a streetwise way and he has been unnecessarily confrontational with NHS staff.