Good old anonymous senior sources in the NHS. You can always rely on them to tell you the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, can’t you? In their latest act of radical candour on behalf of patients and frontline staff, these cloak-and-dagger freelancers briefed the BBC about their growing unease at Wes Streeting’s insistence that the NHS is broken.
Speaking to the corporation ahead of the health secretary’s Labour party conference speech, the sources worried that Streeting’s unflinching descriptions of current NHS failings might “spook patients” and “make it really difficult to raise staff morale”, with one brave yet unnamed hospital leader muttering darkly: “If the government isn’t careful, it will cause lasting damage.”
