Wes Streeting was last night accused of 'open leadership manoeuvres' after unleashing one of Labour's strongest attacks yet on Nigel Farage.
The Health Secretary has faced claims he was positioning himself as the man to succeed Sir Keir Starmer after telling colleagues how to tackle the threat from the 'populist right'.
He told Labor colleagues that the antidote to Farage's “miserabilist, declinist vision” for Britain's future was to implement real reforms to the NHS.
Streeting's inflammatory call to take up arms was accompanied by a promise to save £650m in one year alone by cutting NHS spending on 'con artists'.
Last night, however, he was accused by friends and foes alike of casting himself as the man with the charisma and vision to replace the prime minister.
Farage told the Mail on Sunday: 'He clearly sees himself as the next leader.
'But it's the Labor government who are the miserable ones – we're the happy, optimistic ones.'
And a senior Labor MP agreed that the Health Secretary was making 'open leadership manoeuvres', saying: 'This makes Wes clear in his claim to succeed Keir.
Wes Streeting was last night accused of 'open leadership manoeuvres' after unleashing one of Labour's strongest attacks yet on Nigel Farage
The Health Secretary told Labor colleagues that the antidote to Farage's “miserabilist, declinist vision” for Britain's future was to implement real reforms to the NHS.
The Health Secretary has faced claims that he was positioning himself as the man to succeed Sir Keir Starmer
“Some of our right-wing MPs will see him as the one with the charisma to take on Farage.
“But many on the left and even the moderate left will see him as just a pale imitation of Tony Blair and will not go near him.”
The claims come as Labor MPs grow increasingly nervous about the threat from Farage, with polls showing reforms are now almost neck-and-neck with Sir Keir's party.
And in a speech at the Fabian Society conference yesterday, Mr Streeting warned: 'the populist right is coming for us.
“We have to be serious if we want to beat them.”
The Health Secretary made it clear that this meant delivering real reforms to the NHS, and defying reform and Tory hopes that Labor would fail.
He said: 'If we don't turn the NHS around, they will have the opportunity to beat us at the ballot box and overturn 76 years of universal healthcare, publicly funded, free at the time of need.'
Mr Farage responded last night by saying: 'Wes Streeting is so afraid of reform that he has now resorted to lying about our plans for the NHS.
The Health Secretary made it clear that this meant delivering real reforms to the NHS, and defying reforms and Tory hopes that Labor would fail.
Mr Farage responded last night by saying: 'Wes Streeting is so afraid of reform that he has now resorted to lying about our plans for the NHS'
'Let me be clear: under a reform government the NHS will always be free at the point of delivery.'
However, Mr Streeting hit back by posting a report on X that Mr Farage himself had previously said: 'If you can afford it, you pay; if you can't do it, don't do it.'
Sources close to Mr Streeting also dismissed talk of leadership maneuvers as 'complete nonsense' and insisted he had ended his speech with a tribute to the way Sir Keir had transformed Labor and won the general election.
Mr Streeting also yesterday unveiled plans to halt all NHS spending on expensive external staff.
Under a 'Plan for Change', he said all NHS trusts in England are expected to cut this spending by at least 30 per cent next year, saving £650m in one year to reinvest in the frontline , based on current spending levels.
The Health Secretary said: 'The NHS should not be forced to waste billions on scammers while patients remain on waiting lists.
'This staggering waste of taxpayers' money must be e.g
'This Government will crack down on the use of agency workers and reinvest the savings on the frontline, to deliver our Plan for Change and reduce waiting times.
Mr Streeting also yesterday unveiled plans to halt all NHS spending on expensive external staff
'We are also training more staff so that the NHS has the staff it needs to treat patients in a timely manner again.'
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) officials said strict spending limits will be set for each financial year, which Trusts must not exceed.
They claimed this was an important step towards the government's ambition to completely eradicate the use of NHS agency workers.
The DHSC added that the NHS was forced to spend £3 billion on hiring healthcare workers, including doctors and nurses, in the last financial year.
It highlighted that agency spending was already declining.
But it was still expected that a further 30 per cent reduction would save the health service hundreds of millions of pounds, improve the quality of care for patients and increase safety.
