The government is to scale back its £12bn NHS IT system in what the Tories are calling a “massive U-turn”.
The Tories and Lib Dems have been calling for the IT system, which has been hit by costly delays, to be axed.
Mr Darling told BBC One’s Andrew Marr show he was determined to halve Britain’s budget deficit over the next four years and as a result public spending would be “a lot tighter than it was in the past”.
“For example, the NHS had a quite expensive IT system that, frankly, isn’t essential to the front line.
Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said it was “another government IT procurement disaster”.
“After seven years Labour have finally acknowledged what we’ve said for years, that the procurement for NHS IT was costing billions and not delivering,” he said.
The electronic patient record system, which is thought to have cost about £12bn so far, was commissioned in 2002 by then prime minister Tony Blair, and was meant to be completed by 2010.
Mr Lansley told BBC One’s Politics Show the Tories would scrap the “enormous centralised IT system” and instead give hospitals “the opportunity to buy IT systems” that could transfer images, patient records and prescriptions electronically.
People who read this article also read...
