OUR prized National Health Service faces a £7 billion funding shortfall under “extreme” Tory plans to slash public spending, Labour warned last night.

The party’s Budget analysis shows Chancellor George Osborne will be forced to abandon promises to protect NHS spending in order meet his £30bn cuts target.

Mr Osborne said in Wednesday’s Budget that he will to cut spending for unprotected government departments by £13bnin the next Parliament to achieve the “savings.”

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) braced the public for “a much sharper squeeze on real spending in 2016-17 and 2017-18 than anything seen over the past five years” after Mr Osborne announced his spending plans.

And Labour warned that areas like local government, policing and defence were unable to take any further cuts, leaving health spending at the mercy of the Chancellor’s axe.

Just a 1 per cent cut in NHS funding could see 48,000 nurses, courtesy of £7bn in lost cash.

“Next time, they’ll cut to the bone,” was the stark warning on a new Labour poster campaign.

Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham said: “The Tories are completely silent on the NHS.

“They had nothing to offer it in the Budget and are desperate not to talk about it during the election campaign.

“The OBR has predicted a roller-coaster ride for public services in the next parliament under these Budget plans. The trouble is, the NHS is in no fit state to go on a white-knuckle ride.”

He added: “It is clear that the NHS as we know it can’t survive five more years of the Tories.”

Mr Osborne claimed the “sun is starting to shine” as he delivered the Con-Dem’s final Budget on Wednesday.

He tried to make his new spending plans appear less severe by promising austerity would end a year earlier than planned in 2019-20.

But Labour’s analysis based on the government’s own figures shows cuts to public services in the next parliament will be almost twice the level of last five years.

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said: “With gobsmacking audacity, the Chancellor claimed this week that his economic plan has worked.

“But today’s figures are a timely reminder of the truth, which is that he’ll run a deficit £50bn deeper this year than he originally planned.

“The Chancellor is borrowing so much more because his plan failed.

“And his plan failed because wages stagnated, leading to the longest decline in living standards since Queen Victoria was on the throne.”