Labour will halt a controversial hospital meal plan if elected next month, the party's health spokeswoman says.
It is claimed the Health Benefits Ltd proposal, which could mean Dunedin and Southland Hospital patient meals will be produced in Auckland, will save up to $120 million over 15 years.
Labour health spokeswoman Annette King said through a spokeswoman the ''poorly thought out'' plan did not have agreement from health boards.
Savings had been over-hyped, and the plan was poorly communicated and would be cancelled.
Asked if the cost-saving entity would be disestablished, she said a Labour government would ask senior health board financial heads for their view.
If retained, its work, including whether its planned $700 million savings were ''real or imagined'', would be reviewed.
The plan was revealed in April last year, and progress has been slow.
Service and Food Workers Union national secretary John Ryall said the long delay was because HBL had had to drop its original plan for a national food service because health boards fought it.
Now, HBL was focused on the three Auckland health boards, as a regional service, which other boards could then join, Mr Ryall said.
Asked if boards could realistically refuse to join a plan that promised huge cost savings, he agreed it would be difficult, but said: ''they've put up a pretty good fight so far''.
''The problem with the food is it's about money. It's not about the quality of the food, the good of the patients. It's simply about money, and it's about privatising the food service,'' Mr Ryall said.
HBL was trying to ''stampede'' over health boards, patients, and workers, to make its promised cost savings for the Government.
HBL spokesman Steve Fisher said it was too early to discuss details of the proposal as business cases were still being prepared.
Southern District Health Board member Richard Thomson said recently health boards had no choice but to be part of HBL cost-saving programmes.
In June, a memo written by an unnamed health board manager claimed HBL represented the biggest single risk to New Zealand's public health system in generations.
Its costs had ballooned, while its projected savings now had a payback period of more than 60 years.
The memo likened HBL to a Ponzi scheme, and said hundreds of jobs in provincial New Zealand were in a state of flux because of the centralisation drive.
The Government dismissed the memo as politicking ahead of the general election.
