David Ruffley MP has today urged local people to sign the 'biggest ever' birthday card for the NHS to celebrate its 60th birthday. The anniversary of the National Health Service falls on 5th July.

An electronic card, which everyone can sign, is at: www.happybirthdaynhs.co.uk.

To coincide with the 60th birthday of the NHS, the leader of Her Majesty's Opposition, David Cameron MP, has unveiled new proposals for its future. These include:

• Scrapping top-down Whitehall targets which distort clinical care- for example, crude targets for waiting times in A&E, has led to the indignity of patients being left in 'trolley waiting areas' and ambulances

• Focusing instead on outcomes, looking at the results of treatment- such as survival rates and patients' satisfaction

• Publishing more information about the quality of NHS care, including league tables for mortality in heart by-pass and valve surgery

David said:

'On the 60th anniversary of the NHS, I want to go on record and applaud the hard work of NHS staff past and present. Our hard working NHS staff are the key to its success and I admire their commitment, often in the most difficult of circumstances. The NHS binds us together nationally and it is of enormous importance to everyone across Suffolk.

'It is fitting that we should mark this historic milestone by looking at ways of improving the NHS. We need to give more information to patients and focus on improving outcomes - not ticking the Government's Whitehall boxes. Rather than constant, costly reorganisations, as we have seen over the past 11 years, we should allow doctors and nurses to get on with their job of saving lives.'