The NHS is rarely far away from a crisis. Even so, the last few months have been particularly tough. The junior doctors’ strikes have grabbed the headlines, but perhaps even more worrying for the future of the NHS is the state of its finances. Trusts are falling deeper into debt, yet the biggest budget squeeze is still a year away. It may be time, then, to rethink the way the health service is funded. The subject was tackled by a panel of eminent doctors and journalists at a recent Spectator lunch. The question was: ‘Can the NHS afford the healthcare we want?’ a strong consensus held the answer was no and that the NHS needed more money to cope with dramatically rising demand. That was the easy bit. The harder question was how the money should be raised.