THIS month marks the 78th birthday of the NHS.

Our National Health Service is Britain’s proudest creation. From the ashes of war, the Labour government led by Clement Attlee set out to eradicate the scourges of ill health and poverty. ( Never again would a lack of money stop a family getting the treatment they needed.

Throughout the almost eight decades that the NHS has served the British people it has become our greatest institution, always there when we need it.

It has survived existential threats to its existence, emerging broken but never beaten. It had been broken by a decade of underinvestment, bloated bureaucracy and by ditching the reforms made by the last Labour government.

We know that unless the NHS changes, the argument that it is unsustainable will grow ever more compelling. It really is change or bust.

That’s why one of our first acts in government was to develop a ten-year plan for health. This plan sets out how we will rebuild our NHS to protect in this century what Attlee’s government built for the last that the provision of high-quality healthcare is determined by need, not according to wealth.

The plan focuses on the big three shifts our NHS needs. We need to move from analogue to digital and embrace the efficiencies that technology will bring, we need to be forward thinking by shifting away from merely treating ill health to preventing it and crucially we need to bring health closer to home by transitioning from hospital to the community.

Here in Barnsley, we are seeing the benefit of the new way of delivering care where people need it. Thanks to the investment and leadership of the previous Barnsley Council administration, we have our trailblazing Health on the High Street hub at the Alhambra.

With this centre, which was realised with a partnership with the previous council administration, the local NHS and the Labour government nationally, we are truly leading the revolution in delivering health services.

It’s estimated that 100,000 people will go through the doors of the centre in the Alhambra, with their care easy to reach, their services more joined up and suited to how people live their lives.

We’re already seeing this pay dividends, with 75.1 per cent of people across Barnsley meeting the 18-week referral to treatment target, up from 70.5 per cent in 2023/2024.

Through extending this model across the country, we will ensure that waiting times come down further, and that people can access the healthcare that they need no matter who they are or where they live.

For too long, this has not been the case, but the Labour government is stepping up to ensure that we can continue to rely on our brilliant NHS for generations to come.