The Tories must take full advantage of the opportunities in the private sector and embark on a radical agenda of NHS reforms, says Jacob Rees-Mogg

It was precisely this sort of sentimentality and hysteria that has held back to the NHS for a long time.

But finally, the Labour Party has turned a corner.

The Shadow Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has declared, as if he were vying for a Tory leadership bid, that quote “the NHS is a service, not a shrine.”

He went on to say “pouring more money in without reform would be like pouring water into a leaky bucket…

We will also use spare capacity in the private sector to cut the waiting lists. Middle-class lefties cry “betrayal”. The real betrayal is the two-tier system that sees people like them treated faster — while working ­families like mine are left waiting for longer.”

And whilst I think that the Labour Party is really trying to say as little as possible before the next election, in the hopes of winning the election solely based on the mantra that it isn't the Conservative Party, I am grateful to Mr Streeting for beginning this conversation.

Because it is only with this conversation that we can fix our crumbling health service.

The NHS already uses the private sector to its advantage.

Take the example of GPs. GPs have independent contractor status. Whilst they are part of the NHS, they are separate from the bureaucratic machine of the NHS.

In mental health services, the NHS has been using the private sector for residential mental health care for years. And it works.

Private contracts are also granted for pharmacies, out of hour GP appointments, patient transport, diagnostics, the list goes on.

The point is, none of this has threatened the principle of healthcare being free at the point of use.

But there are countless other areas where we can use the private sector to help the struggling health system along.

The trouble is, for too long the dialogue has always been “if we don’t have fully nationalised provision and supply of healthcare, then we’ll become like America”.

But this is nonsense.

Other nations have devised healthcare systems that are free at the point of use but don’t necessarily have the entire system nationalised.

Germany, that liberal paradise to which we are so often compared by the socialists, uses an insurance based system that comes out of your wages. It enables markets to compete whilst ensuring everyone is covered.

Australia has better healthcare results, spends less as a proportion of GDP, and operates under a public-private model.

Japan uses an insurance based system, but ensures everyone is covered. It has better results than we do.

It’s similar in Canada, France and Belgium.

Mr Streeting said in his article for the Sun that the public doesn’t trust the Tories with NHS reform.

If there were any truth in this, it is because of decades of fear mongering from the Labour Party about privatisation.

If even the Labour Party can recognise that using the private sector to assist the health service is not the same as privatisation, and that none of this threatens the basic tenet of free at the point of use healthcare, then the Tories must embark on a radical agenda of healthcare reforms, taking full advantage of the opportunities in the private sector.

To paraphrase Disraeli: Labour men, Tory measures.