[ rising demand ] Tens of thousands of NHS nursing and doctor posts are vacant. The figures, obtained by the BBC, show the extent of the NHS recruitment crisis. Health unions blame poor workforce planning, but officials say the NHS has more staff than ever before. Data from a BBC Freedom of Information request shows that on 1 December 2015, the NHS in England, Wales and Northern Ireland had more than 23,443 nursing vacancies. That's equivalent to 9% of the workforce. For comparison, the average vacancy rate across the UK economy from November to January 2016 was 2.7%, according to figures provided by the Office for National Statistics. [...] These figures show that between 2013 and 2015, there has been a 50% increase in nursing vacancies, from 12,513 to 18,714. For doctors, the number of vacancies went from 2,907 to 4,669 over the same period, an increase of roughly 60%

The Labour leader attacked Jeremy Hunt after the BBC revealed the health secretary used academically unverified and unpublished data to back his plans. Last July, in the pay row with junior doctors, Mr Hunt said there were about 6,000 deaths a year because of the lack of "a proper seven-day service". But this assertion was later questioned by academics. Emails show one of the author's of the unpublished paper, which Mr Hunt was using to justify the 6,000 figure, was unhappy with how his study was being used. [...] This figure was then used regularly by the government in its argument for changes to doctors' contracts. [ they needed it to justify back-door cutbacks to NHS budget. Same w bursaries! ] &! bbc.in/1hVMGcz

[ backroom door austerity! through redefining what a weekend is. misrepresenting weekend death data to argue for "7-day" NHS and only able to do that through redefining what weekend constitutes (7pm sat to 7am mon). but cancer surgeries don by not-junior docs are not being done on sundays anyways! only emergency procedures are done on weekends by on-call registrars, consultan surgeons, and on-call surgeons for that weekend. duh. and it's interesting the NHS Chief has not come out publicly about that! And was Jeremy Hunt coming up with that 7-day week nhs? or Cameron thought spin how to appeal to tory constituency? ] Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt says that the government will impose the new contract on striking junior doctors as a last resort. “I hope it doesn’t come to that,” he told the Today programme. Mr Hunt said that the NHS was “busting a gut” to make sure every A&E department is able to function if junior doctors withhold emergency care as planned in a forthcoming strike.

Inadequate support of greater concern than trouble getting a GP appointment and desire for more joined-up services

[ misrepresentation of some paper (weekend deaths)! ] Speaking on the BBC's This Week, he says the government is "playing on public fears of under-staffing" at weekends, saying the NHS already offers world-class class surgery, seven days a week. “If you have a medical emergency, you will always be seen,” he says.

From trade union reform to parliamentary process, the Tories show a pattern of contempt for the protocols of democracy [...] Thanks to a crafty, albeit constitutionally permitted, parliamentary manoeuvre, a cut that will affect hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged young people went through without proper debate or vote on the floor of the Commons. David Cameron commands a slender majority, but it is enough to pass most of his legislative programme in a more transparent fashion. Only the most controversial elements risk obstruction, either through rebellion on the Tory benches in the lower house or rejection in the upper one. [...] That episode, like the vote on student grants, is consistent with a pattern displayed by this government of impatience with democratic norms, verging on contempt. One habit is bundling measures of primary importance up in secondary legislation. [...] lay the foundations for a long-term Conservative monopoly on government.