Former minister and Conservative MP Dan Poulter has defected to the Labor Party.

In an exclusive TV interview, the MP for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich told the BBC on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg that he could no longer look his NHS colleagues and patients in the eye and remain Conservative.

Dr Poulter, who works part-time as a doctor, said the Conservatives were no longer focused on public services.

Downing Street has just been informed of his decision and has not yet responded.

Dr Poulter said he would remain as a Labor MP until the general election and then resign.

Defections are rare. These deviations are harmful. And Dr Poulter’s attack on the Conservatives’ record on the health service in particular will sting.

The MP, who still works in NHS constituencies, said he had been thinking about leaving the Conservatives for the past few months, after being first elected in 2010. The pressure on the NHS made him decide.

The consultant psychiatrist, who was Minister of Health for several years under the coalition, He told the BBC: “I found it increasingly difficult to look my NHS colleagues in the eyes, my patients in the eyes and my constituents in the eyes in good conscience.”

He suggested the party had stopped valuing public services, saying: “The difficulty for the Conservative Party is that the party I was elected on valued public services… had a compassionate view of supporting the most disadvantaged in society.” .

“I think the Conservative Party is in a very different situation today.”

He said he had “no animosity” towards Prime Minister Rishi Sunak but the country needed a general election as soon as possible, adding that the Labor Party and Sir Keir Starmer could be trusted to lead the NHS and the country.

Sir Keir said he was pleased with Dr Poulter’s decision to join the Labor Party, adding: “It is time to end the Tory chaos, turn the page and take back Britain’s future.”

No date has been set for the next general election, but they must take place before the end of January 2025.

Asked if he thought his constituents who elected him as a Conservative would be angry with his decision, Dr Poulter said he could have gone ahead with the election and then withdrawn, or started a by-election, adding: “I thought that since there will be elections very soon, it is better to work for my constituents until the end of this Parliament.”

It is only the third Conservative defection since 2019.