
The UK government has announced an extra £1 billion of funding to support 800 new ambulances, 100 specialist mental health vehicles and 5,000 more sustainable hospital beds. This sum has been ringfenced for 2023-24 to provide extra capacity and support for staff in the urgent and emergency services. Rishi Sunak’s plan also includes £1.6 billion, to be provided up to 2025, for adult social care, and £150 million for building 150 new facilities to support mental health care.
This two-year plan comes in response to emergency healthcare in Britain being labelled a “national emergency”. A recent parliamentary report investigating access to emergency services has highlighted the lack of alternatives for emergency 999 calls and broken models of primary and community care.