HEALTH experts reacted more critically to Mrs May’s recently announced health plan, than did our new conservative parliamentary candidate in her letter to SNJ January 16, writes retired NHS nurse, Jo Smith.

"The extra £3.5 billion is not the major boost the Prime Minister is claiming. It will simply allow GPs and community services to keep up with demand" said the Nuffield Trust.

The Royal College of Nursing chief said: "This announcement begs the question as to who will operate these bespoke support networks; dedicated healthcare for care residents and rapid response teams.

"The number of District nurses employed by the NHS has halved since 2010".

Sadly, while this government continues to insist on market tendering for services in the NHS, a sizeable proportion of any future funding increases will be devoured by accounting fees and profits to privatised companies.

Likewise their unwise decision to remove bursaries to train nurses and other health care professionals will continue to have an adverse effect on the number of available trained staff.

Jo Smith (retired NHS nurse)

Amberley