From the House of Commons
The explosive issue of cancer care dominated Prime Minister’s Questions today, with Harriet Harman asking about the government’s white paper on the NHS, published this week, and focusing on the question of whether patients will keep their right to see a cancer specialist within two weeks.
David Cameron claimed that, after 13 years of Labour government, we have “not the best” cancer treatment results in Europe.
Harman claimed that the Prime Minister was “dodging the question”. In reply, Cameron asked Harman if it was now Labour policy to cut spending on the NHS, at which point John Bercow, the Speaker, intervened to remark that it was for the leader of the opposition to ask questions, not answer them.
The heated exchanges followed an initial sombre question from Harman about the Northern Ireland riots. Cameron praised the “restraint” of the police forces.
Later, there were several mentions from the Tories of Peter Mandelson’s memoirs, but again the Speaker intervened, ruling that this was not “government business”.
At the end of the session, referring to the Labour front bench, Cameron said: “We have a new problem in British politics: it’s called ‘deficit deniers’ and I’m looking at a whole row of them.”
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