Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting has said the NHS must be reformed rather than “pouring more money into hospitals”.
In a stark statement, the Labour frontbencher said the health service is "still salvageable” as he vowed his party could “turn the situation around” in its first term if it was in government.
In a speech hosted by health think-tank the King’s Fund, Mr Streeting said: "I think that despite all the challenges we see in the NHS today, it is still salvageable.
"And, more than that, there is enormous opportunity in this country with the strengths we have in life sciences, technology, and with the brilliant people that we have working in the NHS today.
“We have got to stop the obsession with simply pouring more money into hospitals, we have to think about what the primary care system looks like and if we grab that mantle of reform, there is no reason why we can't turn the situation around, and to see far better outcomes by the end of the first term of a Labour government."
The MP for Ilford North admitted he thinks it will take “a decade to get the NHS back to where it was under the last Labour government” as he blasted the Conservatives for having done so much damage to the NHS.
Mr Streeting reiterated Labour's pledges to train 7,500 more doctors and 10,000 more nurses every year, as well as end the 8am scramble for GP appointments.
He also pledged to make black maternal outcomes a "priority" after a report this week found not enough was being done to tackle the "outrageous" issue of black women being almost four times more likely to die in childbirth.
“I'm not sure what's more outrageous - the statistics that we saw this week, particularly about black maternal mortality, or the fact these aren't new figures and yet so little seems to have been done about it,” Mr Streeting said.
He emphasised Labour’s commitment to train more midwives but added “there are deeper underlying structural issues”.
Mr Streeting pointed to Keir Starmer having asked Baroness Doreen Lawrence to lead a wide ranging review into racial disparities and inequalities as evidence the party is actively seeking to address the issue.
He added that he was committed to looking at class and racial inequalities across the NHS “to make sure that we do not end up in a position in the future that we're in today, where your class, your income, or indeed your ethnicity plays a factor in whether or not you die earlier than your white counterparts or your wealthier counterparts.
“I think closing that gap is the mark of a civilised society and the challenge for a Labour government.”
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