IN the last 13 years the number of NHS managers has increased five times quicker than nurses - nurses who spend collectively a million hours a week on paperwork. Hospital infections kill three times as many people as road deaths. 48,000 elderly people in residential care have been forced to sell their homes to pay for it. UK cancer and lung disease survival rates are among the lowest in Europe, with cancer drugs available elsewhere in Europe not available here. In the past two years, three million people tried but failed to get an appointment with an NHS dentist.

The NHS is one of the biggest single issues that people talk and care about.

Conservatives have repeatedly pledged their commitment to the NHS. I would never say that Labour don’t care about it - they have tripled spending on health - but they have mismanaged it badly.

Under Labour’s targets, a patient with a broken toe lingering in an A&E department for nearly four hours has priority over a patient newly admitted suffering a heart attack.

Conservatives will deal with these issues. We will protect NHS spending from any budget cuts. The NHS will refocus on the genuine results of treatment rather than box-ticking artificial targets. Patients will be able to choose their GP, their hospital and their consultant.

We will build many more single rooms to help end hospital-based infections and the scandal of mixed sex wards.

People will have the option of paying £8,000 to secure residential care if needed instead of having to sell their home. And we will restore access to NHS dentists and dental checks for school kids.

But the NHS is also about our community, here in Wyre Forest. Working with my Conservative colleagues across Worcestershire, we have helped to bring a new radiotherapy unit to the county.

We are working with local campaigners to keep head and neck cancer services in Worcestershire. We want to be a centre of excellence for cancer care. And we will continue to work together to make sure that Worcestershire gets a fair deal with health funding.

By working together as a team, Conservatives in Worcestershire can help the local NHS deliver more to our county. We can support and help everyone working in the NHS. And by working as a team for the county, we will help to return services to Kidderminster and Wyre Forest.