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What are we talking about this week? The desperate state of the NHS (again). While the health service contends with record high waiting lists, it is also facing record lows of public approval. According to the latest annual British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey, less than one in four Britons (24 per cent) reported that they were satisfied with the NHS in 2023, a 5 per cent drop from the previous year. These record low levels are a contrast to 2010, when satisfaction levels were at 70 per cent – an all time high. The yearly survey, which gathers responses from residents in England, Scotland and Wales, has tracked public satisfaction with the NHS since 1983.
What’s the gist? The long and short of the survey’s findings can be described as: nobody is pleased with the NHS, and the points of contention are in its key basic functions. Those who reported feeling dissatisfied with the health service were prompted to rank the reasons why. The most (un)popular reason was that it “takes too long to get a GP or hospital appointment” (71 per cent). This was followed by people feeling that there are not enough NHS staff (54 per cent) and that the government is failing to spend enough money on the health service (47 per cent).
The fact that satisfaction in both the NHS overall and in individual services is low differs from trends seen in previous periods of public dissatisfaction with the health service. Researchers at the King’s Fund think tank, in their analysis of the BSA survey, note that when NHS satisfaction dropped to a low of 34 per cent in 1994, “satisfaction with individual services remained relatively high (for example, more than 70 per cent of respondents were satisfied with GP services during this period)”.
How low can you go? Well, quite. The 2023 polling not only reveals record-low dissatisfaction with the health service as a whole, but with specific NHS services too. For instance, only 34 per cent of respondents said they were satisfied with GP services – the lowest level of satisfaction recorded since the survey began. NHS dentistry satisfaction levels, meanwhile, fell to a record low of 24 per cent in 2023, while dissatisfaction increased to a record high of 48 per cent.
Do I want to hear any more? It’s not pretty. Both inpatient and outpatient services remain at record low levels of satisfaction. Only 35 per cent said they were satisfied with inpatient services (no change from the previous year); while 44 per cent were satisfied with outpatient services, down 1 percentage point from 2022. Social care isn’t excluded: only 13 per cent reported feeling satisfied with the services offered by local councils in 2023.
Another record low? I’m afraid so.
So, everyone’s angry at the NHS? Yes and no. Over half of respondents said that they were “very or quite dissatisfied” with the health service in 2023, again, a record high. (24 per cent said they were “neither satisfied or dissatisfied”.) But despite the low overall satisfaction, responses to other questions made it clear that “the public still believe in the principles of the NHS”, according to the King’s Fund researchers. The survey reveals that a “large majority” agree that the NHS should be available to everyone (82 per cent), free of charge (91 per cent), and primarily funded through taxes (82 per cent).
On the final point, the public attitude seems in contrast to the government’s actions in regards to public finances. In March’s Budget, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced a 2 per cent cut in National Insurance, having done the same thing in his Autumn statement last November. But only 6 per cent of respondents said that they would choose for the government to reduce taxes, while spending less on the NHS. Nearly half (48 per cent) of respondents said they would prefer increasing taxes to spend more on the health service.
In a sentence? The NHS has a long, long way to go to win back the satisfaction of the public, but fundamentally Britons still believe in everything it stands for since the health service was established in 1948.
Read the full analysis from the King’s Fund
If you have a report, briefing paper or a piece of research that you’d like featured in the Research Brief, get in touch at spotlight@newstatesman.co.uk.
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