Jeremy Hunt has said he needs more time to fix the mental health crisis in the NHS – five years after saying he wanted treatment to reach parity of urgency with physical health, where people could expect treatment in Accident and Emergency departments on the same day they arrived.

He made his comments in an interview on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show (although This Writer understands he also appeared on ITV’s Peston on Sunday) where, astonishingly, he denied that his own “efficiency” savings were to blame for making matters worse.

Perhaps we’re all missing the point. He is working towards parity between mental health and physical health care.

After all, the quality of service at A&E departments has plummeted on his watch and the NHS in England is preparing for yet another winter crisis, with too many patients expected to need help from too few doctors and nurses, in hospitals with far too few beds.

And there’s another important point, relating to the way Conservatives have (for example) pushed wages through the floor, cut benefits, and applied benefit sanctions to people who don’t deserve it. In short:

Members of the public – and people who use the services Mr Hunt praised – had their say about his comments on the social media. Consider the following:

https://twitter.com/DancingTheMind/status/924592360612352005

https://twitter.com/BenNutland/status/924573380363374592

This is probably the most telling comment of all:

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