§ Our British national health service, with treatment free at the point of delivery, is the envy of the world. It is the best system of health care that I have ever encountered. In every modern civilised society the demand for better health care, for new techniques to save lives and improve 160 our quality of life grows constantly and remorselessly. This Government completely understand that. That is why we have increased spending by some 75 per cent. in real terms since 1979.
That is why the Prime Minister has pledged on our behalf more resources for the national health service in real terms every year, throughout the next Parliament—a pledge which, to my continual mystification, the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) has not yet brought himself to match.
We are also spending that money better. We have reformed the NHS so it is much better managed and much more efficient. It is no good opposing these improvements, because when waste is reduced, more can be directed to higher quality patient care. This means that patients get more treatment and care out of every extra pound that we spend.
For next year, we will increase current spending on patient services in the NHS by £1.6 billion, or 2.9 per cent. in real terms. The real increase in current spending for hospitals next year over and above inflation will be 3 per cent.
On top of this, private finance initiative investment will play an increasingly important role in providing new health care facilities. The PFI contract for the Norfolk and Norwich hospital scheme, worth close to £200 million, was signed yesterday, and others will follow. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health for not signing it tomorrow, but I do not think that he had the Budget in mind. There are many in the pipeline—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] He had the people of Norfolk and Norwich in mind and the efficacy and investment in our national health service. PH investment in the NHS will reach some £900 million over the next three years on top of the increased public spending I am announcing. I think that the Labour party has at last belatedly become converted to that source of investment in our great national health service.
The NHS will continue to grow and continue to improve. We are totally committed to the national health service as a public service providing high quality up-to-date treatment, free at the point of delivery.
By our decisions on public spending, we prove that the NHS remains at the top of the Government's priorities. The NHS has been safe in our hands, it is safe in our hands and it will always be safe in our hands.