-
Question
Can the Minister tell us where the £29 billion she set out will be spent? The chief executive of the NHS Confederation said yesterday that increases in NHS staff pay will account for a large proportion of the funding increase. Can the Minister confirm how much the pay offers from the independent pay review bodies, alongside increased national insurance, will cost, how much of this funding will have to go to cover that and how much will actually make it to the frontline to improve patient services?
-
Question
Will the Minister explain how the current settlement will allow for continued investment in new hospitals and technology, considering the capital budget is flat?
Minister reply
The government's relentless focus on spending within the NHS ensures that despite a broadly stable capital budget, we are delivering necessary reforms and technological advancements to improve efficiency. We have already seen significant increases in diagnostic capabilities across various constituencies.
-
Question
Given the investment announced today, can the Minister assist in arranging a meeting with the relevant Minister for dental care to ensure funding is directed towards improving access to NHS dentists in Gloucester?
Minister reply
I will make sure that my colleague, the Minister for Care, hears this request and arranges a meeting to discuss how to improve access to NHS dentistry services in your constituency.
-
Question
Will the funding boost deliver the additional 8,000 GPs needed for timely appointments? Can it bring back dentists into the NHS and resolve the issue of dental deserts?
Minister reply
The commitment to improve primary care includes addressing shortages in general practitioners and enhancing access to essential services like dentistry. We are working on reforms to make the NHS dental contract more sustainable, aiming to eliminate 'dental deserts' and ensure all patients can access necessary treatments.
-
Question
Our spending on the NHS is now as much as the entire GDP of Portugal. We used to be a country with an NHS attached to it, but we are almost becoming an NHS with a country attached to it. Of course we would welcome this spending if we got the same outcomes that people get in civilised countries, like the Netherlands or Australia, but every time I mention fundamental reform, I am dismissed as wanting to bring in privatisation, so it is hardly worth raising that issue. Will the Minister at least look at the successful outcomes, including some of the highest life expectancies in the world, that are being delivered in countries like Australia and the Netherlands, to see how we can deliver better outcomes?
Minister reply
I was expecting the right hon. Gentleman to talk about the funding model, and I am disappointed that he did not; it is something that he has talked about for many years. I do not know the details of the Australian model, but will ensure that he gets a proper answer. I am always happy, as is my right hon. Friend the Secretary the State, to look at models from across the world. We want to learn from the best, and we want to deliver the best in the NHS.
-
Question
The Minister has demonstrated the difference that a Labour Government make to our NHS, and to the people of our country. As she mentioned, reform is needed. May I draw her attention to the report by the independent Commission on Palliative and End of Life Care? Around 100,000 people cannot access hospice care, and too few people are able to access specialist palliative care. The report demonstrates a new system of end of life and palliative care that will transform people’s end of life experience. To go alongside the reform agenda, will she ensure that we continue to support primary care?
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for the great work that he is doing to support progress on work at the RAAC hospitals in his constituency. He makes the excellent point that such issues exist not only in hospitals. As our settlement makes clear, we understand the strain in primary care, as well as in mental health services and community services, which often do not get discussed.
-
Question
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Dr Chambers), I welcome the increased investment, and the attention that the new Government are giving to the NHS. I would like to turn our attention to dentistry. My constituency of South Devon is a dental desert. I welcome the announcement of 700,000 extra dental appointments, but we have lost three dental surgeries since the election last year, and more are on the brink. The Government have been in office for a year now, and have talked about reforming the dental contract with the NHS. If that contract is not reformed, we will lose so many dentists that we will never be able to catch up. How long will it take the Government to announce a newly reformed contract with NHS dentistry?
Minister reply
The hon. Lady is right to highlight the shocking state that dentistry was left in by the last Government. They could have reformed that contract at any time over the past 14 years. We were ready to do that in 2010, but things worked out differently; we left office, and the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives between them did not reform the contract.
-
Question
I very much welcome yesterday’s statement, the funding, and the fact that the funding will go on for several years. Does the Minister agree that we depend on the people in our NHS? Will she join me in congratulating Dr Cameron and all the teams at the West Suffolk hospital?
Minister reply
I am very happy to thank Dr Cameron and the whole team. As ever, with his vast experience of the health service, my hon. Friend makes an excellent point. We are reliant on clinical and managerial staff to make the system better.
-
Question
The Minister will know that I too want to abolish corridor care at the Queen’s hospital in Romford. I thank her deeply for meeting me on Monday, with the chief executive of the NHS trust for Barking, Havering and Redbridge, Matthew Trainer, who is appealing for a new A&E facility at the Queen’s hospital. The situation has led to patients being cared for on trolleys in corridors. Will the Minister ensure that what was said at our meeting is carried forward?
Minister reply
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that this is unacceptable. I was pleased to meet him and his local NHS leaders this week. They made, as hon. Members always do, an excellent case. Clearly, the situation was left badly under his Government.
-
Question
As an NHS physiotherapist, I welcome the statement. The Government will soon launch their 10-year plan for our NHS, in which a focus will be a move from sickness to prevention. Will the Minister set out how the spending review will support Dudley integrated care board and other ICBs in bringing healthcare on to our high streets?
Minister reply
The hon. Lady raises an important point about the role of local health systems.
-
Question
The Minister will be well aware of Sir Andrew Dilnot’s ambitious plan to put a cap of £86,000 on the cost of social care. It was never going to be easy to implement that. Previous Governments postponed the plan and the Chancellor effectively scrapped it completely. May I appeal to the Minister to work across party lines and focus on the crippling debt that hits hard-working families when they come to the end of their working lives and need the support of the state?
Minister reply
I agree that this issue absolutely needs to be resolved. There was agreement previously, under the coalition, but it was unceremoniously dumped by the subsequent Tory Government in 2015. We have ensured we will address this issue by appointing Louise Casey to lead an interim report on social care and prevention.
-
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for welcoming the Government’s investment in the health service, particularly the capital investment announced yesterday. This includes the rebuilding of RAAC-infested hospitals such as Frimley Park hospital and the continuation of work on Shotley Bridge hospital replacement in Consett.
-
Question
More money for the NHS is welcome, although if we had our way, it would be raised by taxing extreme wealth fairly. The small amounts of money for social care announced in the spending review are nowhere close to the funding needed to tackle the social care crisis, and the burden is put on local authorities. When will her Government stop going slow on social care? When will they hold the long-promised and much-delayed cross-party talks? When will they recognise that we cannot fix the NHS without fixing social care?
Minister reply
The economics of the Green party are fantastical; however, we see that in the local council in Bristol. We are getting on with tackling social care as announced in the spending review and as part of the Casey review.
-
Question
I warmly welcome the largest-ever capital investment in our NHS in the spending review yesterday, building on the Chancellor’s announcement in last year’s Budget of the money to rebuild RAAC-infested hospitals such as Frimley Park hospital. That was committed to by the previous Conservative Government but never paid for. With the Government standing four-square behind rebuilding Frimley Park hospital, does the Minister agree it is time for Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust to get on with it very quickly?
Minister reply
We are keen that people get on with this work very quickly as it is at the beginning of a long queue in the new hospital programme. We have put the new hospital programme on a firm financial footing, and we encourage the team at the Department of Health to ensure timely progress.
-
Question
The hon. Member for North Herefordshire is right about social care. We have a system in which healthcare is dependent on social care, yet all funding is going into the NHS, not into social care. The Minister pretends the exact opposite of the truth. Will she share a more honest assessment with the House? Labour had 14 years to think about it, and here we are with the funding going into the NHS while the social care system underneath it is broken.
Minister reply
I have already given a history lesson about some of those 14 years. When the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats were in the coalition together, there was a commitment which the Conservatives then broke when they got into government by themselves.
-
Question
I thank the Minister for her statement and the excellent work that this Government are doing in bringing additional investment in the NHS and bringing waiting lists down. We have had to make really difficult decisions to clear up the mess left by the previous Government, and I am sure we all agree that we need to protect our charitable adult social care providers.
Minister reply
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point about social care providers who do an amazing job for many of us with close family members supported by them. It is important that they are supported and work, and I will ensure he has a response to his question.
-
Question
I welcome the funding announced to repair hospitals with RAAC which will hopefully include Harrogate district hospital in my constituency. It has received some money to remove RAAC in one building, but it still has a £15 million business case waiting for the next round of RAAC repairs.
Minister reply
We are committed to ensuring that those RAAC hospitals are sorted and fit for purpose. I encourage Harrogate district hospital to work closely with the team at the Department of Health which is working really well.
-
Question
The NHS is the No. 1 issue for my constituents, and I know that they will welcome the investment in the spending review. My constituency is a rural area, and one thing people often raise with me is ambulance waiting times which have improved in every category over the past year.
Minister reply
My hon. Friend is right to raise the issue of ambulances. We are keen to ensure that ambulances do not spend time outside hospitals but rather get back on the road where they need to be through initiatives like the 45-minute turnaround time and release to rescue scheme.
-
Question
Can the Minister confirm from the Dispatch Box that with increasing amounts of councils’ budgets rightly being spent on care, they will get funded for things such as the fair pay agreement separately from core social care spend?
Minister reply
Over the coming weeks, my colleagues from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government will outline in more detail how the spending review will fall out.
-
Question
Can the Minister assure me that as we advance these plans for the NHS, we will ensure that we tackle those waiting lists? Far too many women are paying the price for years of inaction under the Conservatives.
Minister reply
We want to learn from the women’s health hubs and ensure they are an integral part of neighbourhood health services. We remain committed to tackling waiting lists and ensuring better access to care.
-
Question
Will this new money for our NHS ensure that all cancer waiting time targets are met by the end of this Parliament, and can the Minister confirm that those targets will be included in the 10-year health plan?
Minister reply
We will issue a cancer plan later in the year. We are determined to meet waiting list targets and include them in the 10-year health plan.
-
Question
May I ask the Minister to keep on being ambitious, in the hope—because hope is all I have—that some of it will rub off on the Scottish Government?
Minister reply
We remain willing to work with the SNP and any other party that wants to serve patients better. We are committed to 8,500 more people working in mental health.
-
Question
What provision have the Government put aside for those years of increasing maintenance costs?
Minister reply
We want to eradicate deficit funding from the system and are looking closely at how every single system uses all of its money. We will visit North Devon soon.
-
Question
Does the Minister agree that nearly one year on, this Labour Government are really tackling the disastrous Conservative-Liberal Democrat reforms introduced under the Lansley legislation?
Minister reply
We have learned from the lack of focus on patient care and are committed to making the NHS work better for patients.
-
Question
Will the Minister ensure that areas with such disparities, like Blackburn, receive targeted support? Will she meet me to address these long-standing imbalances in healthcare provision?
Minister reply
We want to move everybody towards funding targets and are happy to discuss this further. We will bring forward the neighbourhood health service to make sure people can be seen more locally.
-
Question
Can my hon. Friend please assure me that we will use this settlement to redouble the work we have done on elective waiting lists, while also putting a real focus on mental health waiting lists?
Minister reply
We are committed to supporting mental health services with 8,500 extra staff and ensuring young people in schools receive support.
-
Question
This investment is so welcome, because my constituents in Cannock Chase have been struggling to access urgent care between their GP and accident and emergency since our hospital’s minor injuries unit was temporarily closed in March 2020. Despite the welcome investment in Rawnsley surgery, Chadsmoor medical practice and Red Lion surgery in my constituency, our ICB plans to kibosh any hope of our MIU reopening. Does the Minister agree that this Government’s huge investment in our NHS needs to be felt in the parts of the country, such as my towns and villages, that were so badly let down by the Conservatives? Will she meet me to discuss the worrying urgent care reform proposals for Staffordshire?
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for welcoming the extra support for GP and primary care. I am sure he understands from our urgent and emergency care plan that we have a number of arrangements for making sure that people are seen urgently in local community settings. It is for local ICBs to decide on the best way, within that urgent emergency care plan, for people to be seen locally and treated within the available resources. I am happy to meet him, perhaps at an upcoming surgery, to discuss that further.
-
Question
My constituents in Blackpool South will never forgive or forget that the previous Government left us with the worst health outcomes in the country. We have an ICB having to make £350 million of cuts. The hospital that my son and I were born in has been left inadequate and one of the worst in the country. We have dental deserts. People cannot get access to mental health counsellors or GPs. I welcome the millions of pounds allocated to Victoria hospital and to health outcomes in my constituency by this Government, and we are seeing waiting lists finally coming down. Does the Minister agree that we need to continue on this path and give deprived areas, such as Blackpool, more support to get our waiting lists down to an acceptable level?
Minister reply
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that his constituents and constituents across this country will not forgive the Conservatives for the state in which they left the NHS. That is clear from Lord Darzi’s diagnosis. We have still had no comment from the Conservatives on whether they acknowledge that. We are determined to be about the future, and that is what this settlement and the Chancellor’s announcement yesterday are about. It is about putting that extra funding that we raised last year into services and into a reformed system that reaches all parts of this country. We will tackle health inequalities, making sure that people who have not had that access and people who suffer worse health than others are raised up. We must take the best of the NHS to the rest of the NHS.
-
Question
I thank the Minister for her statement today and for her ongoing commitment to the NHS. I welcome the growth in day-to-day spending on the NHS and this Government’s commitment to bringing down NHS waiting times. However, may I gently advocate for Harlow in respect of the future of the UK Health Security Agency? It has a business case, details, designs and a site ready to go, and the estimated timeframe has consistently been assessed as the best value for money and the quickest to deliver.
Minister reply
I like how my hon. Friend says “gently”, because honestly no day goes past without him talking about this issue or, indeed, his new hospital. He is right, and he is a fantastic campaigner for the people of Harlow. He has made his point again, and I cannot make any further comment today, but he will be hearing from the Secretary of State soon on that issue.