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Nick Robinson
Political editor
Nick Clegg's NHS letter: Now the nervous wait
There is at first sight something rather puzzling about the deputy prime minister writing a letter calling for his own government's legislation to be amended. This, you might think, is something he could have said behind closed doors to the prime minister and the health secretary.
Well, of course, he has, but the point of today's letter is to to try to give what Mr Clegg calls "final reassurance" to everybody who is anxious about the Health Bill, that the NHS won't be treated, in his words, like "the gas, electricity, or water industry".
Those Mr Clegg is really trying to reassure are in his own party - peers who have the chance to vote on important amendments this week and activists who are being urged to vote to kill the bill in an emergency debate at the Liberal Democrat Spring Conference in less than a fortnight's time.
That's why Nick Clegg has written his letter with the activists' darling and a member of the Lords - Baroness Shirley Williams.
Their message is that the Lib Dems have made what Mr Clegg's aides say used to be "a bad Bill" better. The message coming from the Conservative side of the Coalition is that if all that the Lib Dems need are what are being described as "minor changes" so be it. Mr Clegg will now wait nervously for the message sent back by his own party.
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Comment number 1.
nautonier27th February 2012 - 18:16
Reason Clegg is nervous is that at some point - now he's stuck his nose into the 'supply side' NHS tinkering mess - some nosey reporter at the BBC or somewhere is going to ask Clegg - "and what would you do with the NHS ?" and to which an honest Mr Clegg would say "I haven't got the faintest idea - I'm jolly lucky to be here & only because the other two parties messed up at the general election"!
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Comment number 2.
happyterry27th February 2012 - 18:34
This is all getting too painful - like watching a married couple bickering, but this is the NHS. Is there no way for the Government to implement some face saving device and abandon the bill (and why are the Liberal Democrats so craven on such a key issue?). This looks like dragging on and de-stabalising the Government. Watch this space (if you can bear it!)
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Comment number 3.
sagamix27th February 2012 - 18:35
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.
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Comment number 4.
Sarah27th February 2012 - 18:42
These proposed "final amendments" do not reassure me atall. It doesn't sound as if competition and the role of the private sector will be limited very much atall. The NHS could still end up with a US-style market, which is probably what the Tories want. Cameron is probably happy with Clegg's intervention as it doesn't change anything much: they just think it will sound better to the public.
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Comment number 5.
Eatonrifle27th February 2012 - 18:43
Frankly I don't give one for what Clegg says in his grandstanding letter. What I think now, is if both the Royal Colleges of Surgeons and Physicians now come out against the bill, as seems likely then surely, surely even someone of Cameron's monumental arrogance must see it is the end of this farce once and for all.
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Comments 5 of 154