Lansley must go, says Lib Dem MP (From St Albans & Harpenden Review)

Lansley must go, says Lib Dem MP

12:47pm Sunday 12th February 2012 in National News © Press Association 2011

David Cameron's efforts to quash speculation over the survival of Health Secretary Andrew Lansley have suffered a setback after a senior Liberal Democrat demanded his removal.

The Prime Minister used an article to insist he was "at one" with Mr Lansley and backed the controversial NHS reforms going through parliament.

A series of senior Tories were also deployed to television studios in a bid to shore up the Cabinet minister's position.

However, Lib Dem deputy leader Simon Hughes broke ranks to demand Mr Lansley be shifted from his post.

"My political judgment is that in the second half of the parliament it would be better to move on," he told the BBC's Andrew Marr show.

Several Conservative Cabinet ministers are said to have privately criticised Mr Lansley's handling of the Health and Social Care Bill, with one suggesting the Government's problems were now on the scale of the Poll Tax in the 1980s.

A Downing Street source was also quoted last week saying that the Health Secretary should be "taken out and shot".

However, writing in The Sunday Times, Mr Cameron stressed that there was no alternative to reform.

The Prime Minister - whose disabled son Ivan died in 2009 - said: "As a parent, night after night, I've known what it is to have the NHS by your side...

"But while the values are right, the system isn't. It needs to change - and that is why I am at one with Andrew Lansley, the reform programme and the legislation going through Parliament."