Wellingborough by-election: Improving the NHS

The NHS has been an issue in the by-election campaign

Voters in Wellingborough will go to the polls on 15 February to choose a new MP. We have been asking residents what issues matter most to them ahead of the election, and candidates have told us what difference they would make if elected.

'Why has the NHS been so underfunded in the last 30 years and what are you going to do about it?'

Ian Johnson's son works in the NHS

Ian Johnson, who is 67 and retired, wants to see more money going into the NHS and for the staff to be paid more.

"My son is a nurse and has to work 60 hours a week to make ends meet. No one should have to work that many hours. I think doctors and nurses are heroes and should get a decent amount of money for doing the job".

'Can you do something about waiting times?'

Boban Anthony knows people waiting for NHS dental treatment

Boban Anthony, who is 40 and a community nurse, asks what the candidates would do about waiting lists and in particular the time it takes to see a dentist.

"A lot of people are suffering and waiting in pain for too long, particularly to see a dentist, and they are just told to take painkillers. The alternative is to go to the private sector and pay a thousand pounds or so. A friend of mine had to wait two months for a tooth extraction."

What the candidates say

Helen Harrison - Conservative

Under Conservative leadership, the NHS has received an historic £33.9 billion cash boost. We are upgrading hospitals, recruiting more staff, and investing in training. We have also announced a long-term plan backed by £200 million to deliver millions more NHS dental appointments. I am determined to secure an Urgent Care Centre at the Isebrook Hospital site, while also advocating for an accelerated rebuild of Kettering General Hospital. I am committed to ensuring that our NHS thrives and, as a chartered physiotherapist in our local NHS, I am confident that I will be a champion of our local healthcare.

Gen Kitchen - Labour

The constituency of Wellingborough is a health desert. We have no A&E, no urgent care centre and ambulance stations have closed. I have spoken to people here who have been quoted hundreds, sometimes thousands of pounds for dental work, as they are forced to go private. Labour's plan would address the immediate crisis by providing 700,000 more urgent dental appointments and recruiting new dentists to areas most in need. Labour would pull every available lever to get patients seen faster. Our plan to cut waiting lists would cost £1.6 billion a year, paid for by closing tax loopholes for non-doms.

Ana Savage Gunn - Liberal Democrat

In the 2012 London Olympics we had nurses dancing around hospital beds because we have a health service that the world envies. The Government has disassembled and underfunded the NHS. I would lobby for more NHS funding for GP surgeries and for dentists, and I would fight for increases in funding for the NHS.

Ben Habib - Reform UK

The NHS is being destroyed by poor management, bureaucracy and waste. A Reform UK government's priorities would be zero NHS waiting lists in two years. Patients would get a voucher for private treatment if they cannot see a GP within three days and 100,000 more hospital beds by commencing a programme of new hospital construction. All frontline NHS and social care staff would pay a zero basic rate tax for three years and we would write off student fees after 10 years of NHS service. There would be tax incentives for GPs to open new surgeries and we would offer GPs NHS employment with fixed salaries and working hours. We would also reduce immigration to stop undercutting our frontline staff with cheaper imported labour.

Will Morris - Green Party

We have privatisation by stealth which sucks resources away and, when coupled with the ludicrous internal market, creates more not less inefficiency. The answer to funding is not more taxation but fairer taxation. The answer to waiting lists is removing inefficiency from the system, fair pay for health workers, proper retention policies and more investment in training and staff rather than plundering other countries. There is the money for this, we are just wasting it on vanity projects. We also need to take control of services so they cannot be removed without consultation, which is what happened with the Bozeat Surgery.

Marion Turner-Hawes - Independent

I would push for significantly increased funding for the NHS and for the re-balancing of funding to be used between crisis and preventative services in our community. I would campaign for robust community care and support services to be re-instated and properly funded. I would also push for bigger GP practice surgeries to be "upscaled" to provide urgent care services across this constituency. I would also do all I can to help people access GP and dentist services as well as out of hours support and make sure all health and social care staff are rewarded much better for their hard work

Andre Pyne-Bailey - Independent

I would propose/support funding to promote careers in healthcare within schools and bursaries for students at university. It would be immoral to have a massive recruitment drive for foreign professionals as this would mean depriving people in other countries. In the interim, it may be prudent to send some patients to other countries that have the facilities and professionals for treatment. 

Kevin Watts - Independent

We need to pay NHS staff more and the NHS budget has to be twice what it is now. Better paid NHS staff means more people would work for the NHS and would prefer working there than in the private sector. Government after government has made the decision not to give the NHS the resources that it needs. Extra funding could be gained by taxing companies that do not pay tax in the UK. If you do not pay tax you cannot trade here.

Three of the candidates: Nick the Flying Brick, Alex Merola from Britain First and Ankit Love Jay Mala didn't reply to our request to take part.