A TORY pledge to shift health spending to Merseyside and other poorer areas would apply to just 3% of the NHS budget, it was revealed yesterday.

A health expert warned the plan – which David Cameron vowed would "banish health inequalities to history" – would make little difference to the way funding was allocated.

And Health Secretary Andy Burnham accused the Conservative leader of a "U-turn of epic proportions", after a decade of Tory attacks on higher spending in the North.

The clash came after Mr Cameron made his latest audacious march onto Labour territory, declaring: "Today the Conservatives are the party of the NHS."

The NHS would be his "number one priority" in Downing Street, one of only two areas where spending would be protected while other departments would suffer severe cuts.

Mr Cameron also promised a "health premium" for struggling areas, condemning Labour's failure to cut the huge gap in life expectancy and infant mortality. Among the 63 areas earmarked for more cash would be Liverpool, Knowsley, Wirral and Warrington.

Briefings had suggested the Tories would direct "billions of pounds" to poorer areas.

But it quickly emerged that the “weighting” would apply simply to the public health budget – about £4bn annually.

That hinted at poorer areas receiving a few tens of millions of pounds extra, a relatively small sum set alongside the £900m that the NHS in Liverpool alone received this year.

John Appleby, chief economist with the King's Fund think-tank, said: "The Conservatives talk about public health funding. They don't talk about the total NHS budget.

"The NHS spends probably roughly £3bn on public health – that's about 3% of its entire budget – and that's the sort of money they're talking about allocating on the basis of need."