Shadow Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, is boycotting talks on the National Care Service for England, insisting he wants one of the options – the one he dubbed the “death tax” – ruled out first.

When it comes to boycotts, Lansley has form.

Last year, he made a big song and dance about reinstating blue light Accident and Emergency at Burnley General Hospital. In November 2007 it was downgraded to an Urgent Care Centre amidst huge and continuing controversy. A&E migrated to Blackburn.

Capitalising on the public disquiet, Lansley told local papers in Burnley and Pendle there was no reason why Burnley couldn’t have its A&E back – so long as it was accompanied by a publicly available protocol stating which conditions could be treated there. This was indistinguishable from my own position which I had held from the word go.

So, when I met the Health Secretary, Andy Burnham, on 9 November 2009 and he agreed to a review of the Burnley Urgent Care Centre and how it was – or was not – coping I was confident that Lansley would give his views. I urged him to explain his thinking.

The review is, in one sense, second best. I wanted a completely independent review – not one set up by the Strategic Health Authority even though it would be led by the distinguished clinicians Professor Matthew Cooke, the National Director of Emergency and Urgent Care, and Dr Irving Cobden, the Medical Director of Cumbria Primary Care Trust. But it is all that is on offer. And there is no point boycotting it.

It is an opportunity to look again at the controversial changes and to see whether they are delivering what was promised.

I sent Lansley a copy of the review’s terms of reference which explicitly invited submissions from national politicians. In my handwritten covering letter I said I was sure he would be giving evidence.

I am still waiting for a reply.

I don’t want Lansley boycotting the review and then doing his hysterics during the election campaign. Promising to re-instate Burnley's A&E.

Got a feeling that is precisely what he has in mind.