Does the government actually care about the NHS?

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

The government has reaped this chronic state of affairs because of years of underinvestment in the NHS (Getty)

Britain cannot afford to lose – if the medical council figures are correct – 10,000 doctors who may leave to work in Australia, Canada and Ireland due to low pay and working conditions in the NHS.

It is disgraceful and foolhardy not to have negotiated long before now with all groups within the NHS to prevent the millions of patients suffering – and some dying – from lack of treatment. There don’t appear to be any signs of a will to end the dispute (on the governments side, at least), which begs the question: is Rishi Sunak’s government able to offer a planned way out of this mess?

Certainly, since the start of the NHS disputes the government seems to have relinquished any responsibility for the industrial action taken by many facets of the NHS. Although some workers have been placated by improved offers of increased pay, there doesn’t appear to be a wholehearted acceptance of the governments pay deal. In my view, NHS employees have resumed work because they care about the harm their strike has done to their communities.