Government's new health team taking shape

The health secretary in the new Conservative/Lib-Dem government is Andrew Lansley CBE. The MP for South Cambridgeshire has been shadow health secretary since 2003.

'There is much to do,' he says. 'If I have learnt one thing over six-and-a-half years as shadow health secretary, it is that in the NHS we have an immense number of talented, committed and capable people, who want to be trusted to get on with the job. It will be my task to enable the NHS to do this; with our shared ambition to achieve the best healthcare service anywhere in the world.

'To achieve this in the current financial crisis requires leadership and highly effective management. The NHS will be backed with increased real resources but with this comes a real responsibility. We will need progressively to be more efficient, to cut the costs of what we do now, to innovate and re-design, in order to enable us to meet increased demands and to improve quality and outcomes.

'This will not happen in a top-down, bureaucratic system. Decisions must be taken with patients, close to patients and with clinical leadership at the fore.'

Ministers of state include Conservative MP for Chelmsford Simon Burns and Liberal Democrat MP for Sutton and Cheam Paul Burstow, both of whom the MHF have previously worked with.

Two Parliamentary Under Secretaries have also been named: Earl Howe (a Conservative in the House of Lords; Earl is his title not first name) and former nurse and Conservative MP for Guildford Anne Milton. The latter has a long-standing interest in male mental health.

Fuller details of portfolios are on the Department of Health website. We understand Anne Milton has a specific responsibility for health inequalities.

The voting records, interests and expenses of all MPs can be found on theyworkforyou.com.

The Department of Health has also announced that Professor Dame Sally Davies, currently Director General of Research and Development and Chief Scientific Adviser for the Department of Health and NHS, will take up the role of Chief Medical Officer following the departure of Sir Liam Donaldson at the end of May until a substantive appointment is made.