No 10 'Leant On' NHS Boss Over Funding: Laws

Downing Street "leant on" the NHS England chief to get him to reduce the amount of funding he said the health service would need, a former Liberal Democrat minister has said. David Laws said Simon Stevens was told by the Prime Minister and the Chancellor that unless he revised down his request for £15bn to run the NHS properly it would be "discredited". He said that Mr Stevens was told to find more money in "efficiency savings" and bring the figure down to £8bn, which he did.