Today is the 75th anniversary of our NHS.
To celebrate I was joined by local County Durham and Darlington NHS Trust Community Matron, Louise West, at a reception with the Health Secretary in Downing Street yesterday. Louise works across all our local community hospitals, including at Shotley Bridge and Weardale.
As you might know, my mum is a ward clerk in an NHS community hospital too, so I know the crucial job done day in and day out from acute hospitals to community services to help people in real need.
There are so many deserving doctors, nurses and other NHS who do lifesaving work every day from North West Durham who could have been there too.
The NHS is receiving record funding, 40 new hospitals are being built - including tens of millions going into a state-of-the-art replacement hospital in Shotley Bridge, and there are more doctors and nurses than ever before with even more being trained.
I want the NHS to succeed and I am glad this Government is ensuring the funding is going in with so much time, money and attention into making this work for patients and staff both here in North West Durham as well as right across the country.