Suitable for students of Social policy, Health policy, Public policy and Nursing as well as health care professionals.This exciting new book covers the political history of the NHS from 1948 to the present day. It traces the way in which successive governments have tried to deal with problems of a centralised health care system, specifically the tensions between central control and local responsiveness and between managerial influence and medical autonomy. In doing so it examines the role of different actors in the health care policy arena: political parties, professions, consumers and interest groups.