Investment in the NHS must be coupled to an increased pace of reform, the health secretary has told health service bosses.

Alan Milburn said on Thursday that matching demands for more cash would not be enough to create a modern and efficient health service capable of meeting the demands of patients.

Speaking to a conference of NHS trust board chairmen the minister stressed that reform would make money go further.

He highlighted the example of new fast-track surgery centres which separate routine hospital operations from emergency treatment - citing it as an example where investment and reform would ensure more patients were treated more quickly, caring for an extra 20,000 people.

"More investment is conditional on more reform. Decades of under-investment show that putting in too little has achieved too little: too few beds, too few doctors and nurses, too few operations, too many long waits," Milburn said.

His speech is part of a drive by the government to get across the message that modernisation is linked to delivery following Tony Blair's hint that taxes may go up to boost health service funding.

Ahead of the budget the government's message is that the NHS is going to cost more in the future, taxes will have to pay for them but that the money will be spent as efficiently as possible.

The aim is to counter Tory claims that Labour has been profligate and wasted billions on a failing service.

Milburn warned that after a term of government where funding has increased, and with more money set to be pumped in, health workers could no longer blame the 18 years of Conservative rule.

"Simply citing decades of under-investment is insufficient as an argument for greater investment. The case for more investment will only be won if resources are matched by reform. Reform is the key to unlocking the improvements that extra investment can bring," he said.