NHS heads for £983 million Surplus

From the Guardian:

The report forecasts that by the new financial year in April the NHS will have a surplus of £983m, up from the £510m reported in April this year, and the £547m deficit in April 2006

.......[David Nicholson, NHS chief executive] said that the £983m surplus - 1.3% of the £90bn annual bill for the NHS - was the right amount to provide for any unexpected expenditure such as new drugs.

This is good for the public finances. A 1.3% surplus is very small of course - but it's a good sign that the NHS is at last beginning to get the hang of sticking to it's budgets (something it hasn't ever managed to do since it's inception). As people in the private sector know, the discipline of sticking to budgets usually leads to higher efficiency and productivity. It's best these skills are learnt now, while we still have a lot of money to spend on the NHS, rather than in 10 years time when the demographic crunch of an increasingly elderly and ill population starts to weigh on the NHS and the taxpayer.