Finally, some sense on the NHS: Wes Streeting recognises more money is not the only answer

‘There are a plethora of barriers to patient self-help, with GPs acting as gatekeepers for all referrals.’ Photograph: Simon Rawley/Alamy

At last a glimmer of light on the NHS horizon. Labour’s shadow health secretary, Wes Streeting, clearly smarting from his brush with cancer two years ago, has realised that the problem with the NHS is not just cash but structure. Above all, it lies in the costs and delays of an archaic network of occupational demarcations seizing up surgeries and hospitals alike.

The sheer lumbering vastness of the NHS has sent it slithering down the league table of world health services. With a third of GPs on the brink of quitting and many hospitals in wartime mode, services are failing and the rich are fleeing to the private sector.