This week, amidst a media frenzy focused entirely on other matters, Wes Streeting, Health Secretary, officially launched his National Cancer Plan. A cancer survivor himself, he pledged the government to meet all NHS cancer waiting time standards by March 2029 (i.e. by the end of this Parliament) and to raise five-year survival rates so that three in four patients diagnosed from 2035 are “cancer free or living well”. A £2 billion investment package could save 320,000 lives over a decade, with faster diagnostics, expanded access to robotic surgery and regional testing pathways.
With cancer survival rates in the UK falling well behind many other countries and 1,200 people being diagnosed each day, this ambition is arguably long overdue and desperately needed. Lofty ambition aside though, how realistic are pledges like this? After all, cancer waiting-time performance has been off-track for years: the flagship 62-day treatment standard has not been met since 2014-15, so the commitment to hit all targets by 2029 will be a huge challenge. There are warnings that the availability of scanners, staff and funding will determine whether this plan lands.
Wednesday’s announcement reflects a subtle change of tone from the government, with its focus switching from diagnosis to a plan for delivery. Two years in, and with crucial elections in May, voters are eager to see evidence of change.
Talk is cheap of course, and to quote Churchill: “However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results”. Remember Labour’s pledge to build 1.5 million homes this Parliament? Fast colliding with the hard reality of planning, regulation, finance and construction capacity, that target already looks way off-track, with forecasts pointing to a sluggish pipeline and ministers pinning their hopes on a building surge late in this Parliament.
With the power to approve or refuse new homes sitting firmly with local councillors, this was always going to be a tricky one for Ministers. ‘Build Baby Build’ might be a great slogan for someone with the power to deliver planning consents, but that isn’t necessarily Steve Reed.
Ministers can point to structural change: the Planning and Infrastructure Act, plans to redraft the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), mandatory housing targets and the release of grey belt land. But these reforms are midstream. The NPPF consultation is still underway and transitional arrangements will ripple through local plans long before spades hit the ground.
Meanwhile, building safety regulation - or rather the Building Safety Regulator - has become a significant drag on delivery, particularly for high-rise schemes in London. Necessary reforms to the process are underway but schemes have been stalled for months.
The result? Housing starts in London have fallen to levels not seen in over 80 years. In the first nine months of 2025, only 3,248 new homes for private sale or rent began construction: the government’s target is for the capital to deliver 88,000 completions each year.
Reports from manufacturers bear this out: concrete demand has fallen to historic lows. Last week, the Mineral Products Association reported a fourth consecutive annual decline in 2025, with ready-mixed concrete volumes down almost 10% and London particularly weak.
Then there are costs. While materials inflation has cooled, labour, regulation and compliance costs remain high. Developers are seeing rises of more than 15% in building costs over the next five years, while industry surveys continue to cite planning delays and financing constraints as major brakes on delivery. The result is squeezed land values and worsening viability.
Ultimately, both the cancer plan and the housing mission face the same dilemma: bold commitments mean little without actual – and visible – delivery. The consequences are clearly far more profound in cancer care, but the underlying test is the same: turning policy into results. Only if ministers can show faster treatment times or a genuine increase in housebuilding will voters believe that change is real.