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David Cameron stepped up plans to privatise the NHS just months after hiring a top aide who had links to healthcare companies.

Lobbyist Lynton Crosby’s PR firm advised businesses looking to cash in on Tory reforms, leaked files show.

And just three months after the Prime Minister hired the Australian last year, the Government announced new rules forcing health bosses to put almost all work out to be bid on by private firms.

Yesterday Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham suggested Mr Crosby had been involved in the decision.

He said: “Shortly after Lynton Crosby started work for the ­Conservatives, the Government shifted

its position in favour of private health companies by trying to sneak NHS regulations through the House, forcing services out to the market. At the time, experts expressed surprise at the sudden shift.

“Now we can guess why. Once again, it is more proof that you can’t trust David Cameron with the NHS.”

(Image: Rex)

The PM already faced questions – including from Andrew Marr yesterday on the BBC – over Mr Crosby’s role in axing plain cigarette packets and curbs on cheap booze, as well as giving tax breaks to shale gas firms. It emerged Mr Crosby had links in all three areas.

Yesterday Lib Dem president Tim Farron said it looked “dreadful”. He told Sky: “When you’ve got big organisations like the tobacco industry who are able to buy expensive lobbyists, and then one ends up working for the Conservative Party, people are bound to ask questions.”

The UK arm of Mr Crosby’s PR empire, Crosby Textor Fullbrook, advised the group of businesses, called H5, on healthcare after the PM took power in 2010.

Mr Crosby’s firm provided polling that could help the group – now the Association of Independent Healthcare Organisations – overcome public opposition to them taking work away from the NHS.

The PM then hired him in November last year. And in February the Government sparked fury by bringing forward regulations to make health chiefs invite private companies to bid for work.

Labour’s Mr Burnham said: “The more we learn of Lynton Crosby’s business dealings, the greater the number of question marks left hanging over the integrity of David Cameron’s Government. It cannot be right to have people paid to lobby for private health ­organisations wandering round Downing Street when policies are being discussed that could benefit their clients.”

But a spokesman for the Tories insisted: “Lynton Crosby is an adviser to the party. He does not advise on Government policy.”