- guardian.co.uk, Sunday December 22 2002 23.36 GMT
The clinics, which will carry out diagnostic tests and routine operations, will be built and run by private healthcare firms. Tomorrow, Health Secretary Alan Milburn will formally invite bids from British and foreign companies to set them up.
However, earlier promises that they would only handle NHS cases are to be abandoned. The clinics will now be able to treat private patients on the same site, prompting criticism from backbenchers that the Government is effectively allowing an expansion of 'pay beds'.
'I just do not feel that this sort of thing is compatible with what the Labour Party has historically stood for,' said David Hinchliffe, Labour chair of the Commons health select committee.
The Department of Health insists the scheme will still cut waiting lists just as fast despite including private patients, since it will still commission a set number of NHS operations from each clinic. Funding and facilities for the clinics' NHS patients would also be strictly separate from those for private patients.
The move has angered the British private healthcare sector, which had wanted the clinics restricted to NHS patients so that they could not steal business from private hospitals.
The move has also angered the GMB and Unison unions, which have both campaigned against greater involvement of the private sector in running the NHS.
