Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 24th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Norman Lamb]

I am very much aware of the work that my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Sir Bob Russell) have done on this. It is interesting that all the other 10 pilots have continued. They are part of NHS trusts. This is the only one run by a voluntary sector organisation. It is an incredibly valuable service. I was struck by the extent to which people said how much they had reduced their hospital in-patient admissions as a result of the incredibly impressive preventive work that this service provides, and I want to look into it further.

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

14. What support the Government are giving to people with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Jane Ellison)]

The Government acknowledge the challenge posed in supporting patients with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which encompasses a complex range of conditions with a wide variety of symptoms. Diagnosis and investigation of suspected EDS takes place in dedicated regional genetics clinics, with specialist clinics, as my hon. Friend will know, at Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust and London North West Healthcare NHS Trust.

[Andrew Griffiths]

People in Burton have raised £130,000 to pay for a life-saving operation that is not available in the UK for Nina Parsons, my constituent, who suffers from EDS. I have another constituent, Sarah Pugh, who is having to pay for vital physiotherapy and an MRI scan. Will my hon. Friend look at what more can be done to help people suffering the misery of EDS, and will she agree to meet some sufferers to discuss the matter further?

[Jane Ellison]

I am certainly very happy to talk to my hon. Friend about his particular constituents. I am aware of the work that he has done in his local area. He will be interested to know that in 2013 the Government published “The UK Strategy for Rare Diseases” precisely to address such issues and the complexities around them, and aspects of that strategy speak directly to the challenges that he has just outlined. May I also take this opportunity to mention that there is an event tomorrow in Parliament organised by Rare Disease UK to mark rare disease day, at which the Under-Secretary of State for Women and Equalities, my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), will be speaking?

Organ Donation Register

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 17th June 2014 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I look forward to your advice throughout this important debate, and I am also grateful to hon. Members for joining me for it today.

I think it was Daniel Defoe who in 1726 said that the only certainties in life are death and taxes. That is true. These are issues that none of us really wants to talk about, but unfortunately, death touches us all. All of us in the Chamber and anyone watching will no doubt have been touched by the loss of a loved one. Many of us will have lost parents. Some will have lost a partner or a child, a son or a daughter. Those are terrible things to cope with—the sense of loss, and the pain and anguish that come with that terrible event.

The idea that, at such a sad and low time, when people’s world collapses, they should have the forethought, integrity and generosity to make the decision to give the organs of their loved one to support the lives of others is a very difficult thing for us all to contemplate, and we would all struggle with that question when asked. However, I have also spoken to people who have done exactly that: they have given the organs of their loved one for the use of others, to give life to others, and they tell me of the incredible meaning that it gives to the traumatic loss of a loved one. It puts that loss into context. In the words of one parent who spoke to me, their son will always live on. That is a tremendous thing for anybody to contemplate.

However, the reality is that in Britain today, some 7,000 people are currently on the waiting list for an organ transplant—right now, they are at home, ill, waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for the hospital to call, waiting for the chance of a new life. It is hard to put ourselves in their situation, but their lives depend on that phone call and on that organ being made available. The figures show that 1,300 of the people on the list will die. They will become too sick to receive a transplant. That is unacceptable, and it is what I hope we can address in today’s debate.

Last year, 1,323 people became organ donors, compared with 1,164 the previous year. That is good news; it is an increase of 13.7%. Transplants from those donors have risen by a third to more than 3,000. Currently, just under a third of the population of the UK are on the organ donation register. On 12 June this year, it was more than 20 million people—20 million people who have sat down and made the choice that after their death they would like to give life to others. I commend them for that choice and I hope that, by raising the issue today, we can encourage more to do the same.

I congratulate both this Government and the previous Government on the successes that have been achieved over recent years. There is a good news story to tell on organ donation. We saw a 50% rise in donor numbers by 2013 on the previous five years. Thanks to the implementation of the recommendations published by the organ donation taskforce in 2008 under the previous Government, transplants from those donors have jumped by a third. However, there is much that we can do, and much more that we must do if we are to give as many of those 7,000 people as we can the opportunity of life.

The numbers on the registers are still too low—pitifully low. As I mentioned earlier, just under a third of the people in the UK are now registered. In the UK, we have 13 donors per 1 million people, which is still one of the lowest rates in Europe. Compare us, for instance, with Spain, which has an opt-in system, rather than an opt-out system. There, the figure is 35 per 1 million people, which is almost three times as high.

So why are people in the UK not signing up? All the evidence shows—the surveys show—that 96% of the population support the principle of organ donation, yet only 30% of the population register, so what has happened to the remaining 66% or so? The rate of sign-up to the register varies dramatically across the UK. The highest sign-up rate to the register is, of course, in Scotland, where 41% of the population is a registered organ donor. I commend them north of the border, but why is it that in England and Wales, those signed up are only 30% and 31% respectively? Why is the figure so much higher north of the border?

I have been told that some of that is attributable to a simple, but hard-hitting television advertising campaign, encouraging people to sign up as a donor, and more importantly, to discuss their decision with their loved ones. The advert is very simple. A man in front of a camera suggests that people watching tell those they are with about their wishes for organ donation—“Right there, right now, look at everybody in the room and tell them. Make sure that your wishes are clear.” It is a hard-hitting advert, which is clear and effective.

I believe that we should have a simple, hard-hitting campaign just like that in England and Wales, and I push the Minister on it. I have previously written to the Secretary of State for Health encouraging him to do exactly that, and I urge the Minister to look again. Perhaps she could tell us whether she has any thoughts on an advertising campaign, because we all recognise that education, and talking about those things and raising awareness are key.

Education is a key way of encouraging people to sign up, and our schools also have a part to play. The “Give and Let Live” resource pack has been used in schools since 2007. It helps teachers to introduce 14 to 16-year-olds to the concept of organ donation, but it is not compulsory on the national curriculum. I am not suggesting that it should be; I recognise that we have to give head teachers the autonomy to make those decisions and to decide what is taught in personal, social, health and economic education lessons. However, raising awareness about the campaign and encouraging teachers to use the resource will encourage young people not only to sign up and get on the organ donor register, but to talk to their parents about it. That is also important. If we can get this conversation going on around the breakfast table between children and their parents, we will have much more chance of not only getting more people to sign up, but getting people to accept the wishes of their loved ones when that difficult question and difficult moment arises.

The use of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency has also been incredibly successful in encouraging people to become organ donors. People are asked when they apply for a driving licence whether they also wish to join the organ donation register. It has been fantastic; over half a million people sign up every year as a result of that simple question, which takes seconds to answer.

I pay tribute to the Cabinet Office’s behavioural insights team—or “the nudge team”, as the press like to call it. They have done a study of this issue. It is a very interesting piece of work about the most effective way to frame the question to encourage people to sign up. Through a pilot that they ran, they found that just a slight change in the wording could lead to an additional 96,000 sign-ups every year. It is incredible how the human mind works and how it is affected by the questions that are asked. It is important that the Government think logically in that way to encourage people to do the right thing.

Of course, there is another important element to this. It is important not just to get people on the register. Also important is what happens once they are on the register and, sadly, in a position to become an organ donor. It is important that we convert people on the register into donors. We must increase the consent rates among the families. UK donation consent rates remain among the lowest in Europe. Four out of 10 families said no to a deceased relative’s organs being donated even when they were on the register. There has been no overall improvement in the consent rate since the organ donation register was introduced in 1994. How to deal with that is, for me, an important question.

It is interesting that as a person—I hope that the Minister would agree—of sound mind and body, I can decide to donate my organs after my death, yet my family can take that decision away from me and I have no choice about that. We do not do that in any other walk of life. We do not say that I can sign my will, saying that I am going to donate all my money to the Conservative party to secure Conservative elections in years to come, and that my family can then override that will, unless they can prove that for some reason I was not of sound mind and body. We must empower people to make the decision for themselves. Yes, it is important that they discuss it with their family, with their loved ones, but we must recognise that, as a free individual, I have the right to choose to donate my organs and no one should be allowed to take that right away from me. I would be interested to know whether the Minister has any thoughts on that.

The aim of the NHS Blood and Transplant strategy, “Taking Organ Transplantation to 2020”, published last year, is to increase the UK’s consent rate for donations from 58.6% to 80%. That is a very big jump. It is an ambitious target, and I hope that we can meet it. In contrast, Spain has the highest consent rate in Europe, at 84%. Last year, the consent rate in the UK increased by only 2%, from 56.5% the year before.

There is a startling difference between what happens when donation has been openly discussed with family members beforehand and what happens when the decision comes as a shock or surprise. In 2013, 94% of families in the UK agreed to an organ donation when their loved one was registered and had discussed their wishes with them. That fell away to 80% when they were on the register but had not discussed that with their family, but most worryingly it fell to 43.5% when the person’s wishes were not known at all. That clearly demonstrates the need not only to get people on the register, but to ensure that people talk about that when they are. We must ensure, under the system as it stands at the moment, that it is not a solitary decision. If we do not encourage people to let their families know about their decision, unfortunately their wishes, their intentions, the good that they wish to do will be denied.

Of the 20 million people in the UK who have put themselves on the organ donation register, only 60% have told their families that they have done so. We can do the maths: the wishes of 40% of the people who have the potential to give new life to another human being are being denied simply because they did not tell their wife, their husband or their partner what they wanted to happen after their death.

In 2012-13, 115 families overruled their relative’s consent for their organs to be used. I understand why they did that. I understand the pressure, the grief, the pain that those people are going through, but we cannot allow a situation in which those 115 deaths were for nothing. Those 115 deaths, with the conversion rate for organ donation, could have given more than 300 people a fresh lease of life. That is what we must focus on.

The UK will never achieve its potential for donation and transplantation when more than 40% of families refuse to allow donation, sometimes against the wishes of the patient. Obviously, when anyone has lost a loved one, it is a difficult and emotional time, but if the deceased had expressed a clear wish to donate their organs, it seems odd that the family can overrule that. That is why I urge the Minister to think about changing the law so that we can make a choice for ourselves to do the right thing and donate our organs.

The Welsh Government, as the Minister will know, are seeking to deal with the issue. From December 2015, they are introducing an opt-out system of presumed consent unless a deceased person had expressed a wish not to donate their organs. A similar system has produced incredible results in Spain. I recognise that this is a hugely controversial issue. It has been characterised as a case of “Who owns your organs?” I recognise that there are deep and heartfelt reasons why people would oppose such a system. I am also aware that previously the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), said that the Government had no plans to introduce it elsewhere in the UK, because of those cultural, ethical and legal issues.

[Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for allowing me to intervene; I hope that later I will catch your eye, Mr Hollobone, and can make a contribution. This is the first point on which I completely disagree with my hon. Friend. Does he accept that there is no evidence whatever that changing to an opt-out system, even in Spain, which I will deal with in my speech, has delivered more organs? To consider it an ethical issue—the Opposition and many of us base our view on the efficacy of such a change, rather than on the ethical position—is, I think, a mistake.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Griffiths]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. Perhaps he is just a little presumptuous. I was not intending to argue for the opt-out system. All I was going to urge the Minister to do was to look at these issues on the evidence. What I suggest is not that we should come forward with a similar proposal for England and Wales, but that we should follow the evidence. We should look closely at how the system is implemented in Wales and at its impact. My hon. Friend has said that he will talk about the situation in Spain. In Spain, there was a delay before there was an increase in the number of donor organs available, but all the evidence seems to suggest that the system has led to a big increase.

Not only is the debate important, but it raises awareness of organ donation. It gets people talking; it stimulates discussion, which is important. My hon. Friend will know that the principle of the opt-out system is supported by a number of organisations, including the British Medical Association, the British Heart Foundation and Kidney Research UK. As I said, I hope that the Government will look closely at the evidence—at the results of changing the law in Wales—and look to reconsider their position as the evidence develops. My hon. Friend may well be right that there will be no marked increase in the number of organs available for donation, but we do have to follow the evidence, look at the results and decide what we do in the rest of the UK as a consequence.

There was a call by those involved in organ donation committees in our hospitals to look at the issue of the lack of family consent overriding the wishes of the deceased.

[David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on obtaining this debate on what can be a very controversial issue. Does he agree that we should exhaust every possible avenue, whether it be schools or the driving licence organisation or whatever, before we even look at going down the road of an opt-out system, because it is a very controversial issue? In Northern Ireland, 527,000 people—32%—are on the register. The figure is increasing every month. A consultation is ongoing. I understand that in October a consultation will also be carried out on an opt-out system. I think that we need to exhaust every other avenue and then have further debate on that issue.

[Andrew Griffiths]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman; he talks a great deal of sense. The issue is very sensitive and we do not want a backlash in the form of people deliberately coming off the organ register because of ethical and moral concerns. I agree that there is more that we can do. I congratulate the Government on what they have achieved so far, but we can do a great deal more. The issue is important not only because lives are at stake, but because it has a massive impact on NHS costs, which I hope to touch on towards the end of my speech. I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman.

I want to address organ donation in the black and minority ethnic community. I am the Member of Parliament for Burton, which has a large Muslim population—mainly Pakistani and Kashmiri diaspora—who contribute massively to the community. However, there is no doubt that there is a problem with organ donation among BME communities. There is particular concern about the lack of donors coming forward from BME backgrounds. The startling truth is that people from BME backgrounds are up to three times more likely to need an organ but are less likely to donate; they need it more, but they donate less. Only 3.6% of people on the organ donation register are from ethnic minority backgrounds, despite their making up 10.8% of the population and a staggering 27% of the waiting list. Those figures show how skewed the numbers are and how desperate it is that we do something about the issue.

More than 30% of people listed for a kidney transplant are BME, compared with just 5.6% of deceased kidney donors in 2013. Why is that important? NHS blood and transplant statistics show that, on average, people from black and Asian backgrounds have to wait a year longer for a kidney transplant: between 2006 and 2010, the median waiting time for a kidney transplant in the UK for a white person was two years and 363 days, yet for a black or Asian person the wait was three years and 320 days. That is a whole year longer, just because of someone’s ethnicity. Family refusal rates among ethnic minority backgrounds also play a big part. The Minister will know that those rates are much higher than for the population as a whole, with 30% of BME families giving their consent to organ donation, compared with 68.5% of the white population—more than twice as many. That is why it is so important that we tackle the issue of organ donation among the BME community.

Ethnicity is hugely important in organ donation because a person is much more likely to find a match with someone from a similar ethnicity. It is vital that we do more to encourage people from BME backgrounds to sign up to the organ donation register. That is not the only answer; it is also vital that we break down the cultural barriers that prevent BME families from consenting. I commend the Government on the NHS blood and transplant team’s faith and organ donation summit in May last year. It was a good event, and it was agreed that sustained engagement on organ donation by and in ethnic minority communities is needed.

Those are all good words, but I am not seeing them reflected in my community. I am not seeing organ donation being discussed in churches, mosques and community centres. I am not seeing our imams and priests talking to their communities and encouraging them to come forward and donate—to do the right thing by signing up to the organ donation register. None of the major religions object in principle to organ donations, but of course opinions in communities differ. Organ donation is often not discussed, or is called, for example, un-Islamic. We must address such things if we are to break down prejudice and save lives in BME communities as a result. Leaflets have been distributed among different faith communities to that effect, but I hope the Minister will agree that much more can be done.

One way to increase donation that has been advocated is through the use of specialist nurses in organ donation—there is a wonderful acronym: SN-ODs—who were introduced following the 2008 recommendations. We now have 250 SN-ODs, who are there to support people going through the organ donation process and to raise awareness of donating. The National Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Transplant Alliance is calling for more SN-ODs to come from ethnic minority backgrounds, and I agree with it on that. I am not sure whether the Minister is aware that of those 250 SN-ODs throughout the country, just one is from a BME background. Is it any wonder that we are failing to break down cultural barriers at that terrible moment of loss, when we have only one person from a BME background to engage with people who are suffering such loss, and to encourage them to give life to others?

The proposed action plan arising from the summit in May last year featured a number of criteria on increasing engagement with ethnic minority communities. The aim was to fulfil them before September this year, and other criteria by a year hence. I would be grateful if the Minister would give us a little more information about what she and the Department are doing regarding those important criteria.

I know that other Members wish to speak, so I will soon draw my remarks to a close, but I want first to touch on a few points. First, I called for this debate at the request of William Saunders, the chairman of the organ transplant committee at Queen’s hospital in my constituency. It is fantastic to see William and his team, like others throughout the country, engaging as members of the community to try to encourage others to do the right thing and sign up to the organ transplant register. I hope that the Minister agrees that such people are doing a fantastic job in our community and that more must be done.

I also called for this debate because of a constituent, Katherine Sinfield, who sadly was diagnosed with leukaemia. My local newspaper, the Burton Mail, has done a huge amount to highlight Katherine’s case and to encourage people to come forward and undergo stem cell testing in order to find her a match. I am delighted to say that she has now found a match and had her treatment. We all wish her well, and she is doing incredibly well.

Through the Burton Mail’s campaign, I have seen the difference that raising awareness can make. The work of the Burton Mail and the Anthony Nolan trust has resulted in a large increase in the number of Burton residents who have come forward to be tested and who want to do their bit. It has also raised a huge amount of money for the Anthony Nolan trust. If we can encourage similar activity across the country—if Members will raise the issue in their constituencies—we can all play our part in raising awareness.

In conclusion, with such a high level of support for organ donation among the general public—96%—it is surprising that there is such difficulty in finding enough donors to meet the demand for transplants. It is clear that more work must be done. Despite these times of constrained public spending—we all recognise the difficulties in which the Government find themselves—I believe we can do more to solve this problem. Indeed, the “Taking Organ Transplantation to 2020” strategy says clearly that

“no additional funding is likely to be needed to move forward: much of what needs to be done is about working differently rather than increasing resources.”

I am sure that that is music to the Treasury’s ear, but I know that the Minister will put her shoulder to the wheel and help.

Without meaning to put it in crude terms, transplants save the NHS money in the long term. The entire transplant programme saves the NHS £316 million a year, which is money that would otherwise be spent on treatment. A successful kidney transplant operation, for example, costs £17,000, with a future cost of some £5,000 a year. A year’s dialysis for a patient with kidney failure, on the other hand, costs £30,800. The NHS blood and transplant service predicts that, for every year a kidney transplant remains functional, it saves the NHS £24,100 per patient while saving the patient’s life. If ever there was a win-win, that is it. From a financial perspective, it makes perfect sense to want to increase the number of organ donations if they can deliver such savings for the NHS, but more importantly, from a personal perspective, if any of us or one of our loved ones needed a transplant, we would do everything possible to ensure that we found a donor. We would move heaven and earth to give our loved one that chance.

I join the call of the organ donation committee at Queen’s hospital in my constituency and others across the country in saying that more needs to be done to increase the number of people on the organ donation register. Sign up; it saves lives.

--- Later in debate ---

[Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Hollobone, for calling me to speak in this important debate on an issue that has featured strongly in my life. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Andrew Griffiths) on securing the debate, and on the reasoned and comprehensive way in which he presented his case. I apologise to him and to you, Mr Hollobone; I did not notice that this debate was taking place until about five minutes before it started, so I have not prepared. I apologise if my comments are in any way disjointed.

Donating an organ is just about the greatest gift that anybody can make. It is great to do so on death, but it is perhaps even greater in life, such as when people donate kidneys altruistically. I know several people who have done so, and it is one of the greatest things that one can do. This is a particularly good day to discuss organ donation; the night before last, we watched Erik Compton, who has had two heart transplants, come second in the US Open golf championship. It demonstrates how a transplant can not only give life but allow the recipient to live a life that is completely full and to do the most amazing things. Coming second in the US Open is a pretty amazing thing to have done.

My own interest started with a woman I knew, Trudy, who was a constituent, although I was not the MP then. She had one of the first heart and lung transplants at Papworth. She was a most amazing person. Together, we worked to deliver kidney dialysis in Montgomeryshire, where there was none. A unit has now been approved and built, and is delivering a terrific service. Trudy died a couple of years ago, but the dialysis unit stands as a monument to the fantastic woman that she was.

I am a trustee of the Kidney Wales Foundation. One of my disappointments is that I disagree with the foundation—I am the only trustee who takes this view. I disagree completely with what the Welsh Government have done in changing the law to introduce presumed consent. I have always been a bit disappointed by that. The aim of every trustee—me and all the others, although we disagree—is to increase the number of organ donations and the number of organs available. I have always been driven by the evidence. I have never been influenced by the ethical debates; I am influenced only by where the evidence takes me in terms of how to deliver the most organs. I firmly believe that what the Welsh Government have done will absolutely not deliver more organs, despite what they say.

The only time I ever feel resentful in this sensitive debate is when, as has so often happened on the numerous times when I have been invited to speak about this issue in the media, somebody in desperate need of a new organ is interviewed and I am then asked why I want to prevent them from having an organ. I am utterly appalled by the media’s lack of objectivity and the lack of reference to evidence when dealing with the issue.

We need to move forward as best we can and I want to focus on policy for the future. I will make some specific points. We must look at what happened in Spain. Spain has been referred to in this debate on several occasions and it is a huge success story. However, it is often incorrectly referred to as a country that introduced an opt-out system. That claim is absolutely false, even if the Welsh Government used it as part of the basis for their argument. Despite people writing to them—I have written to them—to tell them that that claim is false, it is still what they base their consultation on. It was a disgrace to conduct a consultation on those terms.

What happened in Spain was that opt-out legislation was introduced in 1979. Twelve months later, it was pretty well abandoned. It remains on the books, but like a lot of laws it has never been implemented. Ten years later the Spanish Government realised that the legislation was not working and they introduced a series of other changes. I believe that it is those changes that we should concentrate on if we are to make a difference.

We should also learn from the organ donation taskforce, which my hon. Friend referred to several times. It did a terrific job under its great chair, Elizabeth Buggins, who is one of the most expert people on this issue. The taskforce considered the issue for two or three years. Everyone assumed that the taskforce would recommend a change to presumed consent. However, when it produced a report, all its members had changed their minds because they had looked at the evidence. The person who has taken over from me in Montgomeryshire believed that changing to presumed consent was a way forward. I said, “Look at the evidence.” As soon as she studied that evidence, she changed her mind.

There are things we should do and that we should learn.

[Andrew Griffiths]

I thank my hon. Friend not only for attending the debate, but for making such an important and heartfelt contribution; I think that we all value that. I understand what he is saying about the opt-in system versus the opt-out system and the need to follow the evidence. However, does he agree that ultimately organ donation should be my choice? It should be the individual’s choice as to whether their organs are used for donation after they die, and nobody else’s choice.

[Glyn Davies]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, because that is a perfectly reasonable position to take. I do not know what the figures are—I do not know how often this situation happens—but I want to know them. I am interested in them because the situation seems wrong.

I accept the point that has been made, but the one counterpoint is that sometimes people can change their minds even though they are carrying an organ donor card. However, if people have joined a campaign, we should assume that that is their view. I would be surprised if there are many instances where a family would overrule an individual’s decision; it would be interesting if the Minister could give us the figures to show how often that happens. If it is a major issue, we should address it; I agree with that point.

The first issue that we must deal with is the specialist nurses for organ donation. That is what made a huge difference in Spain, and it is the area where we really need to concentrate. That is what has made the big difference here. Since the organ donation taskforce reported, the number of donations has increased by 50%, which was the target. That is good news, but it is the specialist nurses who have made the difference.

I spent some time talking to the specialist nurse in Shropshire and indeed he has agreed to visit local schools and to organise discussions and debates. We can use specialist nurses to help people to understand this debate, because it is such a sensitive time to talk to people. Talking to people when the person who perhaps they love most looks as if they are alive, because their bodies are still breathing, even though they are brain-dead, and saying that that person’s support system should be switched off and their organs taken is a hugely traumatic experience. We need trained nurses who have the skills to communicate with people in those difficult circumstances. It is the specialist nurses for organ donation who can do that.

[Andrew Griffiths]

Four out of 10 families refuse consent when they are asked to give it.

[Glyn Davies]

I think that that is a repetition of the previous intervention. However, the point is interesting and I would like the Minister to give us the figures to show to what extent that situation actually happens, and whether a specialist nurse in organ donation was involved in individual cases.

The second thing that is crucial, particularly in Wales, is the number of intensive care beds. A lot of people assume that an organ can be donated when there is a road accident or when somebody is suddenly killed in another way, but there can only be a donation when the person is in an intensive care bed and there is the facility to take a donation. We have a shortage of intensive care beds. The number of such beds in Spain is huge. It is much higher than the number in the UK, and in Wales the number is particularly low. That is the sector where the investment needs to go to ensure that there are intensive care beds. I know that in the last year there have been cases in Wales of organs that were available for donation but they were simply not used because there was not an intensive care bed to allow the donation to happen.

The final point I want to make is, I think, the reason why my hon. Friend the Member for Burton secured this debate today. It is about the issue of awareness. We should put every effort we can into campaigns to have everybody tell their next of kin their view on donation. That is what I say to people in schools when I talk to them; I say to people, “Tell your family what your view is, so that they know clearly.” Carrying an organ donation card is helpful in that respect, because it very much gives an indication of someone’s view. That is why I was interested in the point that my hon. Friend has made in his interventions on me.

What we really need, and the Government can afford it, is a big advertising campaign based on the message, “Tell the family. Make sure your next of kin know your wishes.” If we had such a campaign, we would raise the number of consenting next of kin. If we can increase the number of people in Britain who consent to organ donation to the level it is in Spain, we will not have the thousands of people dying that we have now.

Sir Robert Peel Hospital

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 1st April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

As our colleagues rush to watch the second half of the Manchester United match, I should like to raise an issue of somewhat greater importance to my constituents. Although the title of the debate is narrow and focuses on the effect on my Tamworth constituency, the wider implications for users of Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust also affect the constituents of my hon. Friends the Members for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant), for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen), for South Derbyshire (Heather Wheeler) and for Burton (Andrew Griffiths)—I see that my hon. Friend the Member for Burton is in his place.

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way and congratulate him on securing this debate and for being a doughty fighter on behalf of his constituents in the provision of health care. He will know that Queen’s hospital has a deficit of some £3.1 million. It has already saved £9.8 million but needs to save a further £10 million in 2013-14. Given that my own east Staffordshire clinical commissioning group inherited a deficit of £8 million—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. If the hon. Gentleman is making an intervention, I am sure he will wish to be brief. If he wishes to make a speech, he will have to have permission to do so.

[Andrew Griffiths]

I am grateful to you for that advice, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was just about to get to the crux of the matter. Given that the area is £12 million away from fairer funding, does my hon. Friend agree that the health care economy is incredibly fragile locally and that something needs to be done to help us bridge that gap in the short term?

[Christopher Pincher]

I quite agree with my hon. Friend and suggest that we find that way forward, in the first case by seeking a meeting with the Secretary of State to discuss our concerns about the trust.

In nearly four years as a Member of Parliament, this is the first Adjournment debate I have applied for in the Chamber. I hope that gives you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and those on the Treasury Bench some indication of the importance that I and my constituents attach to the subject.

The Sir Robert Peel community hospital at Mile Oak in my constituency provides services for people living in and around Tamworth including a round-the-clock minor injuries unit, an X-ray and ultrasound department, an endoscopy unit and out-patient and day surgery. It also provides award-winning rehabilitation services, care of older people and palliative care services. Indeed, the award to staff for their innovative work on rehabilitation was received only two weeks ago.

The hospital is an important and valued service in our community. Local residents are very attached to it and the medical support it offers to a growing town. They want to be a part of its future, yet as a result of a review that many feel was conducted behind closed doors, Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Peel, has decided to close its day case theatre and surgical ward and is considering withdrawing its endoscopy service. A decision on that service will be made next month. The closure of the day case theatre alone will affect about 1,400 patients each year.

Although no institution, including the NHS, can be set in aspic and although hospitals can and must be prepared to adapt to meet the changing demands of NHS users—for example, the growth in the number of elderly patient means that hospitals need to make more provision for dementia and palliative care—I am concerned that the proposals for the Robert Peel are being hurried through without the fullest consultation and certainly without the fullest involvement of the local community in Tamworth and Fazeley. Although local people are now being invited to so-called listening events, they are about the options for future service provision and not the decisions that have already been made. It appears that the Burton trust has closed its ears to concerns about its plans for day surgery.

The trust has form. A year ago, it introduced parking charges at the Peel hospital with no public consultation and with very little notice. The system it introduced was ill-conceived and badly signed, resulting in a large number of unwarranted fines being levied on some of the most vulnerable people: the old and frail, concerned relatives and the lowest paid. Many of those fines have been overturned. More than 3,000 people signed my petition calling on the trust to rethink its parking proposals and the trust, to its credit, recognised public concern and is now in the process of developing a revised parking system, yet, like the Bourbons, it seems to have learned nothing and forgotten nothing from that experience.

On 5 February, staff at the Peel hospital were called to a meeting to be told that, following what was described as an “extensive review”, the surgical ward would be closed in as little as 12 weeks. They knew nothing of that review, and neither did anyone else—not me, not the local health scrutiny committee, and certainly not the wider community. The review took place between October and January behind closed doors and no one was told. The first the wider community knew was when the story was broken in the Tamworth Herald on 13 February. Yet it was not until 25 March that the trust answered detailed public questions at the Healthy Staffordshire scrutiny meeting, which took place not in Tamworth, but in Stafford. The impression left is that the trust has talked to itself, but not to anyone else.

I have met the chief executive and the operations manager at the Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and they have assured me that the Robert Peel will not close, that minor injury services will be unaffected, and indeed that new services, such as pressure ulcer clinics, may be run out of the hospital. However, I am concerned that the very thing my hon. Friend the Minister was at pains to stress during the debate on amendments to the Care Bill on 11 March—indeed, he made the point directly to me during my intervention—that proper patient and community consultation must take place before decisions are made, is just not happening at the Peel hospital. As a result, patients, staff, hospital users, local councillors and the local community feel that changes are being done to them rather than along with them after recognising their concerns and their advice.

Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust says that demand for the day case theatre has dropped by 30% in the last five years and that 40% of current capacity can be dealt with in GP surgeries. That may well be true. It may also be true that commissioning services in GP surgeries is cheaper and more convenient for my local clinical commissioning group. However, I remain concerned that if this decision is hurried through without proper consideration and consultation, the problems the hospital discovered with its car parking arrangements could be replicated on a far more serious level—that of patient care. We cannot be sure that all local GPs have the necessary equipment, experience and time to undertake all the new procedures they may be called upon to deliver. We need to be sure that Queen's hospital in Burton and the Good Hope in Birmingham have the scope to add to their already demanding schedules without affecting patient waiting times. At the very least it means some people may need to travel further, and spend more on their journey, for their scheduled minor surgery. For an operation at Queen's hospital in Burton, that means travelling some 18 miles along the A38, which, when it is blocked, tends to stay blocked.

I hope my hon. Friend will agree with me that if Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust believes that services at the Robert Peel must be adapted to meet changing needs in the community it serves, it must make those changes having first clearly and openly discussed its proposals with the wider community. A handful of local councillors, important as they undoubtedly are, simply is not good enough, and it must be careful to analyse and accept the sensible advice of the community, including the friends of the local hospital who do so much good work with it. Making its decision at the start of the consultation process, rather than at its end, does nothing to engage public confidence; indeed, it makes a mockery of any consultation.

I hope that my hon. Friend is prepared to send a clear message to Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, and to others, that while they must continually monitor their services so that they remain relevant to and focused on need and so that they deliver the very best patient care, decisions made behind closed doors long before anyone is asked their view are not acceptable. The trust board must agree to the widest local consultation, must collate and publish feedback from its consultation and must be prepared to act on the considered advice of all local stakeholders. Only then will people believe that their local hospital is truly their own.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Dr Daniel Poulter)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher) on securing the debate. I am well aware of his long-standing interest in matters affecting his constituency, including his well-documented support for the Sharon Fox cancer centre. I fully understand why he has raised the matter of the Sir Robert Peel hospital today. I hope that the discussion about the future of services in Tamworth and the surrounding area will move forward constructively following this debate—certainly more constructively than it might have done recently.

Before looking at the local situation in detail, it is important to say a few words about the importance of high-quality engagement between the NHS—in this case the trust—and local patients and commissioners. Decisions about patient care and NHS services should, where possible, be taken in as open and transparent a way as possible. It is important that patient groups and the wider public are properly consulted in decisions about local NHS services. That is clearly outlined in the tests for reconfiguration laid down by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr Lansley) when he was Health Secretary earlier in this Parliament. My hon. Friend was right to highlight the importance of public and patient engagement in the design of local NHS services, in this case for the benefit of his constituents in Tamworth.

The situation at the Sir Robert Peel hospital is of course complicated by events that have taken place with the Keogh review, to which I will return in a moment. The hospital is part of the Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. It might help the House to understand the situation better if I briefly describe the foundation trust and some of the issues relating to the way the Keogh review is affecting services. The foundation trust provides hospital-based services from four main sites: Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in Burton-on-Trent, with acute hospital services including an emergency department; the treatment centre on the Burton Hospitals site, a dedicated centre for day case surgery and treatments; the Samuel Johnson community hospital in Lichfield, with local services, including a midwifery-led maternity unit and a 24/7 minor injuries unit; and the Sir Robert Peel community hospital in Tamworth. I will say a little more about those services in a moment.

The foundation trust provides a wide range of services to a population of around 360,000 across south Staffordshire, south Derbyshire and north-west Leicestershire. Over 47,000 planned and emergency admissions, more than 70,000 A and E attendances and around 13,000 day case procedures take place each year in the foundation trust hospitals across all the hospital sites. The Samuel Johnson hospital in Lichfield, as a community hospital, provides services that are similar to those provided by the Sir Robert Peel hospital in Tamworth. Both community hospitals had previously been run by the South Staffordshire primary care trust. The issue for the foundation trust is therefore much wider than the Sir Robert Peel hospital, because it is required to look across the entire population it serves and, on the basis of the services commissioned, provide a safe and high-quality service for the benefit of patients. The trust has only comparatively recently become responsible for the two community hospitals it operates, both of which it took over in 2011.

[Andrew Griffiths]

The Minister mentioned that Queen’s hospital is a Keogh hospital. The staff there are working incredibly hard to improve standards and are taking big strides forward. The Minister will have heard about the precarious situation in relation to Queen’s and the East Staffordshire clinical commissioning group. My hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher) requested a meeting. Will the Minister agree to meet me, other colleagues and the team from Queen’s hospital and the CCG in order to discuss our concerns and find a solution that improves services locally.

[Dr Poulter]

I will be delighted to meet my hon. Friends to talk further about local issues. There are long-standing concerns, not least the processes triggered by the Keogh review in the trust and the wider health economy.

I turn to the local reconfiguration process. To ensure that the foundation trust would continue to provide the best level of service to the local population, the trust commissioned a report from Deloitte in December 2012. The intention was to address the long-term challenges faced by the trust by refocusing community services, such as those provided at the Sir Robert Peel community hospital, and concentrating on the most vulnerable patient groups.

The Deloitte report set out a number of options. However, as we are all aware, in 2013 the trust was inspected under the Keogh review, which we took forward following the Francis report on Mid Staffordshire foundation trust. Burton was inspected because it had higher than expected mortality rates. The Keogh review was not reassured by what it found. As a result of the inspection, the foundation trust was placed in special measures by Monitor, the regulator of foundation trusts. Monitor continues to work with foundation trusts in special measures to ensure that they return to safe and efficient services as soon as possible. The Keogh review made six urgent recommendations for Burton. Those recommendations have been the drivers for the changes at Burton and at the Sir Robert Peel community hospital.

Sir Bruce Keogh challenged the foundation trust on what its long-term plans would be for the community hospitals. For example, patient activity at both sites in Lichfield and Tamworth has been decreasing across minor injuries, in-patient and out-patient services for a number of years, and is, I understand, on a steadily decreasing trend. There is a need to make changes because, as well as the higher than expected mortality rates, the trust and its local commissioners believe that the health needs of the population they serve are changing.

As a nation, we face changing challenges in health care—for example, the demographic pressures imposed by an ageing population. As the health needs of the population change, it is right that the services provided at local hospitals and in the local health economy also change and that a more integrated approach is taken between local authorities and the NHS in delivering more personalised care, particularly for the frail elderly, and more care in people’s homes and communities.

The foundation trust has already responded to the Keogh review challenge, although much is still to be done. I understand that the reconfiguration to which my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth refers follows on from and continues the response to the Keogh review. Certainly, the aims are the same—to ensure that health care services are of high quality and meet the needs of local patients.

The Keogh review has affected the Sir Robert Peel community hospital, which currently offers local services for people living in and around Tamworth—including, for example, a 24/7 minor injuries unit, in-patient, X-ray and ultrasound department, and an out-patient service. There is one ward providing rehabilitation, care of older people, general medical care and palliative care. Consultant and nurse-led clinics accommodate consultations, investigations, minor procedures, post-treatment follow-up and health promotion.

That is not the full range of services that one would expect at larger NHS hospitals. However, having close-to-home community-based facilities is an important part of meeting the challenge of looking after older people in their own homes. Some such facilities are found at Sir Robert Peel community hospital. I am sure that the local population welcome that and believe it important in delivering high-quality health care in the months and years ahead.

There are currently discussions about the relocation of day case surgery and there is a review of endoscopy. I understand that that would affect about 30 patients a week, with services moving to local GP surgeries, Good Hope hospital at Sutton Coldfield about eight miles away, or the main trust site at Burton.

I understand that further changes are being considered in response to Keogh. However, planning is at a very early stage. I understand that the trust board will be receiving an outline paper this coming Thursday and that no decisions have yet been taken. I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree that it would be highly inappropriate for me to speculate about what option or options might be considered or chosen by the local NHS. I would certainly not want to suggest that there is a Government-preferred option that should be followed; I am not in a position to do that. Whitehall micro-management of the local NHS invariably leads to bad things happening; that is what we have tried to avoid through the health reforms that we instigated in 2012. As I said a few minutes ago, such decisions are local decisions and must be seen to be taken by the local NHS and local commissioners, in consultation with local patients.

Francis Report

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Wednesday 5th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy]

My right hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. Indeed, the clinical commissioning groups have backed the changes, but the local population has not. The clinical commissioning groups are in a difficult position, because they have a budget, and the budget in Staffordshire, as in many other rural areas, is much lower than the national average for England. They are told that if they want to commission services that cost more than the tariff—as maternity services almost always do because maternity tariffs are simply not high enough—they will have to pay the extra. To some extent, the clinical commissioning groups are caught between a rock and a hard place. They may wish to commission those services, but in doing so they will have to stop commissioning others.

It is in the spirit of unity that I ask both the Secretary of State for Health and his shadow to visit Stafford and Cannock Chase hospitals to speak to patients and staff and to hear first hand what they have gone through. I also urge that same co-operation in approaching the long-term challenges facing our health service. The increasing specialisation of services—62 specialties as against 30 in Norway—is driving up costs and resulting in clinicians knowing more and more about less and less.

In Stafford, we have been told that we cannot continue with our consultant-led paediatric service, because we have too few consultants—five or six as opposed to the eight to 10 that the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health says are needed to maintain a rota. By that standard, some 50 or more other consultant-led departments in England should close. Instead of a proper national review with full political co-operation, however, we see the gradual picking off of departments in trusts that have financial difficulties. The same is true with maternity services.

I echo the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell and urge the Government and Opposition to come together with the royal colleges and resolve this matter and much else. The British public are not stupid. They understand that they cannot have every service just around the corner. However, they do not understand why a consultant-led maternity department or paediatrics department in one place must close on safety grounds because it does not have a large enough rota, whereas another with a smaller rota remains open. They also understand the need for more services in the community, but the idea of “slashing” hospital budgets, as Sir David Nicholson is reported in The Guardian as saying, is both incomprehensible and deeply worrying to those whose A and E departments are heaving, whose wards are full and whose children face travelling long distances even to receive general treatment.

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for giving way, and I commend him for his work on this issue. He will know that Queen’s hospital in Burton has dealt with some of the overflow from Stafford hospital following the closure of facilities and services there. Does he share my concern that the special administrators have not met any of the management at Queen’s hospital, and have ignored its letter of concern, stating that closure of the emergency department will mean that it will require an additional 18 to 34 beds? The hospital has heard nothing in response to that letter.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point, which is one of the things that needs to be discussed. I am talking about special administrators liaising with other trusts such as the University Hospital of North Staffordshire NHS Trust, the Burton Hospitals NHS Trust, Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust and the Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust. We are part of an integrated health economy; what affects one affects many others in the region.

Many in the profession have put it to me that we are at risk of gradually losing the skills of general medicine and surgery. That is not to downplay specialisms, because they are vital. However, unless we maintain our district general hospitals, with their ability to deal with the majority of non-specialist cases, we will end up with our specialist hospitals being overwhelmed and without doctors with vital general skills.

It would be disingenuous of me to make such points without raising the matter of NHS funding. The Government are right to have maintained NHS funding in real terms during extremely testing times. They are also right to insist that waste is rooted out. Payments of thousands of pounds to locums for a shift are not uncommon. I could cite many other examples, but there is no time. There is little doubt in my mind that we need to allocate a little more of our GDP to health than we do currently, as we are below the level in France and Germany. However, that is a question for lengthy debate on another day.

As I have said in the House before, we need to take the NHS budget out of general Government spending and convert national insurance into a national health insurance, which will still be progressive and still based on payment according to income, so that we can maintain a first-class health service alongside a competitive tax system.

The Francis report is already having an important and positive effect on the national health service and will do so for years to come. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary and his team for all they have done on that and the seriousness with which they have taken the matter. The emphasis on the safety of patients and quality of care seems obvious to us now, but sadly it was not always a priority. The report not only provides answers and makes recommendations, but asks fundamental questions about the future of our NHS. I have tried to outline some of those questions today. I urge all parties to come together to tackle them for the good of our nation.

Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Lefroy]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention and I entirely agree with that point. There is no point in Stafford’s merging with Stoke if the consequence is that we have a trust that will be financially failing in the future.

The administrators rightly place emphasis on the need for swift action, and I believe that the dissolution of MSFT in the autumn of this year should be possible—indeed, it should be possible even earlier. In fact, I would go further. MSFT has improved greatly in recent years following the huge failings brought to light through the vital work of Cure the NHS and documented in the Francis report. Its recently published hospital standardised mortality ratio figures were the best in the west midlands, but it is fragile and finds it difficult to recruit in some areas. We need the overall arrangements to take immediate effect, even in shadow form. In recent weeks I have detected less engagement than is necessary, because of the uncertainties of the administration process. That needs to stop.

This is all taxpayers’ money. It is our national health service. It is time to work together.

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate and on the work that he has done in recent years. He used the words “fragility” and “uncertainty”. He understands the fragility and uncertainty of the health care economy in Staffordshire. Queen’s hospital, in my constituency, is a Keogh hospital, which has huge financial debts and is struggling to survive. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is essential that this reorganisation takes place and is properly funded? If not, the knock-on effect on other hospitals, such as Queen’s, and on the wider health economy, could be damaging and have a domino effect, with other hospitals falling over.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

My hon. Friend is right. We must make sure that we do not jump from the frying pan into the fire. We must get to a sustainable condition for the health economy. These new overall arrangements must take immediate effect. I urge the Minister to make that clear today, to give the various managements confidence to get on with their work.

I shall make one final point about the future UHNS and the Royal Wolverhampton hospital. The Secretary of State has rightly emphasised patient safety and care since the publication of the Francis report. The new expanded trusts have the opportunity to become national leaders in zero-harm health care, so I urge Monitor and the Secretary of State to seize the opportunity to support them in doing so at this time. Let this administration not be a dry legal exercise. Let it be the chance for Stoke, Stafford, Cannock, Wolverhampton and Walsall to become, even more, shining examples of the best 21st-century health care.

Hospital Mortality Rates

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

That is exactly the reason why we are introducing measures to make sure—[Interruption.] Well, the Francis report was introduced to this House on 6 February, and we have said we will change legislation this year. We have already appointed a chief inspector of hospitals. I do not think we could go much faster. The trouble for the Labour party is not that we are going too slowly but that we are going too fast and exposing all sorts of problems which it wishes did not happen.

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I thank the Secretary of State for shining a light on to the health care provided by Queen’s hospital in Burton. Although Queen’s has a lower unexpected death rate than other hospitals, any unnecessary death is a tragedy for the family concerned. Given that since 2005 Queen’s hospital had a higher mortality rate than Stafford hospital, does he understand the anger of my constituents who have seen their loved ones die unnecessarily and these concerns ignored by Labour?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend’s hospital had excess mortality rates for five of the nine years leading up to 2010 and not enough action was taken, and that is what today is all about. I hope that what his constituents will take from today is that this Government are committed to turning around failing hospitals and putting in place the right leadership, and the reassurance that when their loved ones go to Queen’s hospital or anywhere else in the country, they can get the kind of care they would want for themselves.

Pseudoxanthoma Elasticum

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

May I begin by thanking you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and Mr Speaker for allowing me to make a brief contribution to this Adjournment debate? I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) on the work that he has done on this important issue. He talked about the support group, and I am delighted to say that he has been a great friend of the PiXiEs. His continued support in raising the issue has gone a long way to reassure sufferers that somebody is taking notice and that somebody cares about the terrible situation in which they find themselves.

As my hon. Friend said, I come to this debate because of a constituency case. Mrs Dawn Thomas came to my constituency surgery a few months ago. Hon. and right hon. Members will know that MPs’ surgeries are quite often the destination of last resort. People come to us in desperation when they have tried every other avenue and taken every other opportunity. They have asked everybody else they can think of for help; they then come to their MP and expect us to deliver what others have not been able to deliver. Often we are put in a difficult position, but I can honestly tell the House that when I was confronted by Mrs Thomas and her husband my heart went out to them. Theirs was a desperate situation, and one that in the 21st century we surely cannot allow to continue.

Let me put the matter in context. Mrs Thomas is a young woman—she is 44 years old—and she is a mother. She plays an active role in her community. She works as a secretary in a local haulage company. She enjoys playing darts. She has never claimed benefits; she pays her taxes. She has done everything right in playing her part in the big society, yet she was diagnosed with PXE at the age of 21—I congratulate my hon. Friend on his dexterity in using the technical terminology in his speech, but I will take the easy option and refer to it as PXE. In the meantime, Mrs Thomas lost the sight of her left eye as a result of another illness. She had no real symptoms of PXE until about two months ago, when her sight began to deteriorate rapidly. In desperation, she went to her GP, who referred her to a consultant. The consultant gave her the devastating news that she had PXE and that she would go blind.

There was hope, however, in that there was a treatment out there that could save Mrs Thomas’s sight and allow her to lead her life as she knew it. She applied for the treatment but was refused by the primary care trust. She appealed, and received a devastating, formal, bureaucratic letter that told her in no uncertain terms that she would go blind. To receive such a letter must be a dreadful experience for a wife and mum. That is why she came to see me.

The story was taken up by my local newspaper, the Burton Mail, which campaigned on Mrs Thomas’s behalf, and by the national press. I am grateful to South Staffordshire PCT for looking again at her case. At the first appeal, however, it said that her case was not exceptional enough. I would say that anyone’s sight was exceptional, and that we should do all that we can to save it. I am delighted to say that the PCT reviewed her case, and that she is now receiving the treatment that she deserves.

The PCT has confirmed to me that the cost of treating Mrs Thomas with Lucentis is £18,000, while the cost of Avastin is just £8,000. Let us compare either of those sums to the cost to the taxpayer if she were to go blind. She would be unable to work, and she would be forced to claim benefits. Surely it makes economic sense for the Government to give her the treatment that she needs at an early stage, so that she can keep her sight and continue to lead the life that she loves. I am sure that the House will understand that no MP wants to be in the situation that I found myself in when I had to tell Mrs Thomas that the NHS could not help her, and that she was facing blindness.

Mental Health

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I too offer my thanks and praise to my hon. Friends the Members for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan) and for Broxbourne (Mr Walker) for securing the debate and for putting mental health at the centre of Parliament and the centre of our thoughts today. I also want to thank my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis). Over recent months, he has played Starsky to my Hutch in relation to mental health debates. He also managed to make my speech today in a much more succinct and erudite manner than I could ever hope to do.

I rise today to make a plea to the Minister. He graciously attended an Adjournment debate that I secured on the closure of the Margaret Stanhope centre, a mental health facility in my constituency. It was as a result of his intervention that the consultation was extended, and I was grateful for that. The end result, however, was that the local PCT—South Staffordshire PCT—took the decision to close the centre. As a newly elected Member of Parliament, I assumed that such decisions would be taken based on facts and evidence, and that there would be hard facts to enable the PCT’s claims to stack up. I assumed that its claims about the provision that was going to replace the Margaret Stanhope centre would be demonstrable. As my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East said earlier, however, the reality was a mind-blowing situation, in which the inability of the PCT to make any of its claims stack up throughout the process became apparent. I was disappointed, but not surprised, that the PCT dismissed the petition organised by my local newspaper, the Burton Mail, to save this much-loved facility, which some 8,200 people signed. The PCT decided to dismiss it because, it said, the petition did not deal absolutely to the letter with all the options that were in the consultation.

Throughout the consultation, the PCT made a number of claims. To start with, it said that it had carried out a pilot scheme and could demonstrate that it could reduce the need for in-patient care by a third. Understandably, we asked for the evidence to back that up. After five weeks of asking, it eventually provided me with some occupancy rates. We then asked for further occupancy rates, because the initial ones did not stack up. We asked for daily occupancy rates. It took a further two months for the PCT to give us that information. When we analysed it, it showed that far from reducing the need for in-patient beds by a third, only stays of more than 90 days—a minute part of in-patient care—had been reduced by a third. The vast majority of the figures had stayed the same and one-day admissions had actually gone up.

We looked further into what the PCT was saying. It had claimed that an independent report by Staffordshire university had said that closing the facility would not have an impact. When we looked at the report, we found that the professor from Staffordshire university who had conducted it was also employed by the PCT. She was on the payroll of the PCT, and yet it was praying in aid her report.

We cited a benchmarking report by the Audit Commission, which demonstrated that the PCT had among the lowest provision of mental health beds in the country. It stated that of 46 mental health trusts, Staffordshire had the lowest provision. Surprise, surprise, the following quarter’s evidence showed that my PCT had the highest provision. It had shot up from the lowest to the highest. When we explored that a little more, we found that the PCT had included beds such as those for eating disorders and drug and alcohol problems. It had lumped them all together to fix the figures.

The most worrying thing for me was that when I attended the final hearing where the decision was made, lay members on the panel were asking basic questions such as how many beds were available and what the occupancy rates were, even after a four-month consultation. They clearly did not have any of the information that was necessary to make such an important decision.

I urge the Minister to think long and hard about how we can bring rigour into such decisions. Mental health issues can affect any family, rich or poor, and are no respecter of intelligence, upbringing or anything like that. It is essential that there is a rigorous, accountable and transparent process before PCTs are able to decide to do away with these vital beds. I urge the Minister to consider how the Government can provide those reassurances.

Mental Health Care (Hampshire)

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Wednesday 18th April 2012 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I will speak briefly in support of my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis). We have joined together on many occasions to campaign on the provision of acute mental health facilities, and today I shall express my concerns about how these processes are being undertaken by primary care trusts across the country. If anybody wants to see why the health care reforms that the Minister has fought so valiantly to introduce are needed, PCTs’ actions and decisions to close mental health facilities are the perfect example and demonstrate how they are out of touch, need reform and need to change.

Sadly, three weeks ago South Staffordshire PCT took the decision to close Margaret Stanhope Centre, a unit of 18 acute mental health beds in my constituency. It took that decision not only in the face of huge opposition from local people—8,200 people signed a petition as part of a campaign run by my local newspaper the Burton Mail and the Friends of Margaret Stanhope campaign group—but in the face of the evidence. I am a new Member of Parliament, elected for the first time at the last general election, and I had always assumed that such decisions were based on fact and on evidence—that the PCTs that took such important and often life-threatening decisions would be able to stand up to defend their decisions by proving their case. However, in the closure of the Margaret Stanhope Centre the PCT acted irresponsibly, recklessly and had no factual evidence to back up its decisions.

We conducted some research and found an Audit Commission report: 46 PCTs across the country had taken part in a benchmarking exercise, and the report showed that the average provision of acute mental health beds in those 46 PCTs was 27.5 beds per 100,000. In my trust, however, provision was 14.5 beds—almost half that average. The PCT then prayed in aid the following report, produced during the consultation process. It claimed that, miraculously, its provision had shot up to 31 per 100,000, and that there was nothing to fear.

I tried to get the facts. I tried to get the information. I asked and I asked and I asked for independent data. When the data came, they showed that the PCT had got its figure wrong: provision was not 31 beds per 100,000, but 22. However, when analysing the raw data, the PCT had included such things as mother and baby post-natal depression beds, beds for eating disorders, and drug and alcohol rehabilitation, so actually the figure for provision came out at 13.2. The PCT then prayed in aid an independent report that it had commissioned from Staffordshire university. We asked for that report. When we received it—it took two and a half months to come—we found that the person who had conducted the independent report, Dr Eleanor Bradley, was being paid not only by Staffordshire university, but by the NHS trust. The independent report that it claimed demonstrated how safe it was to close the Margaret Stanhope Centre was actually conducted by somebody on its payroll.

One claim made in the report was that the PCT had been able, through a pilot scheme, to reduce the in-patient stay by a third, but when we managed to drag the report out from the PCT, we discovered a number of things. First, we discovered that for stays in Margaret Stanhope of more than 91 days, it had managed to reduce average stays beyond 91 days by more than a third, from 39 days to 23—a reduction of 41%. However, the vast majority of admissions—88%—were between two and 90 days, and there the reduction was just 1.1%. The PCT claimed to have reduced in-patient stay by a third, but had actually reduced it by just 1.1%. I could go on about how flawed was the evidence used by my PCT to justify the closing of a much loved and much valued unit that serves the most vulnerable in my community. The process began some four years ago, so this is not a party political point, but a point about the actions of the PCT.

We met three weeks ago to discuss the passionate campaign for the continued existence of the unit. The process used to make that decision—

[Dr William McCrea (in the Chair)]

Order. May I draw the hon. Member’s attention to the fact that we are having a debate on the closure of acute adult mental health beds in Hampshire? I am sure that he is building his case from his experience, but it must be linked directly with the situation in Hampshire.

[Andrew Griffiths]

Forgive me, Dr McCrea. I will do exactly that and draw my speech to a close.

What I have seen is that the processes are flawed. What I have seen is that PCTs cannot be trusted to make the decision in Staffordshire and they cannot be trusted to make the decision in Hampshire. It is essential that we reassure the most vulnerable in our communities and in society. It is essential that the Minister understands their concerns properly and reassures himself that the decisions being made in Hampshire, and the decisions made in Staffordshire, are correct and are based on fact and evidence. I urge the Minister to train his laser-like vision on this important issue and to reassure himself, so that he, we and our constituents can be confident that mental health provision in Hampshire and in the rest of the country is not being jeopardised by false decisions made by people who are unaccountable, unelected and are not making those decisions in the best interests of our constituents.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Burns]

I know that nothing would give my hon. Friend greater pleasure, but I must warn him that I have been here too long to fall into that pit. It would completely compromise the independence of local government. I am sure he agrees that all too often, Governments of different political parties have been criticised for interfering too much in local government, and that local councillors are elected to local authorities to make decisions about matters that they, because of their representation of their constituents, are most familiar with. It would not be the way forward for a heavy-handed Minister at 79 Whitehall to issue messages of welcome for things. It would compromise the ethos and independence of local democracy, and the way in which local people elect local councillors to represent their views. Therefore, I must disappoint my hon. Friend.

[Andrew Griffiths]

I am a fan of localism, and I completely support what the Minister says, but does he not recognise that there is a massive lack of democratic accountability in how PCTs operate? No one elects them. They make decisions, and they are accountable only to themselves and ultimately to the Minister.

[Mr Burns]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point, and I have total sympathy with it. It is precisely why we are abolishing PCTs on 1 April next year, and why we are creating the clinical commissioning groups under the Health and Social Care Act 2012. Those groups will consist of GPs, who are most familiar with their patients’ needs and requirements, and will commission care for their patients, and create the health and wellbeing boards which will, for the first time in a generation, have democratic accountability because they will include locally elected councillors and will have responsibility under the Act and the reforms to look out for and to ensure that the needs of the local health economy are being met in local communities. That is a positive and straightforward step in addressing the very problem that my hon. Friend raised.

In response to my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East, decisions on reconfiguration of services will be made by the local health economy, not Ministers in Whitehall. He will be aware that planned changes to in-patient mental health beds in Hampshire have been the subject of local discussions since 2009-10. However, to reiterate the clinical case for change, it will allow investment in better alternatives to in-patient care by increasing home treatment, and developing other measures to support people outside hospital in Hampshire. The number of in-patient beds will decrease by 58, from the current total of 165, to 107. That addresses the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North about how many beds were involved from the start to the finish of the process. The change will also enable growth in community reablement services in the New Forest to help and support people with longer-term mental health needs, allowing them to live a more independent and fulfilling life when that is clinically appropriate.

Doctors and other professionals, the public and service users have all been involved in this process in Hampshire from the outset, and their views have always been taken into account, even when they were not supportive of the proposals and the proposals were not radically changed or abandoned.

Mental Health Unit (Burton)

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Monday 19th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

I thank you, Mr Speaker, for allowing this important debate today. Although this issue may not be big news nationally, it is incredibly important for the people of Burton and east Staffordshire. If we want to make Parliament more relevant and debate the issues that matter to people, debates such as this one, which is about a key local facility, will do a great deal to enhance the House’s reputation for being in touch with real people and their concerns.

I speak about the Margaret Stanhope centre, a very important mental health facility that is much loved and valued in Burton, east Staffordshire and south Derbyshire. South Staffordshire primary care trust is consulting on the closure of the centre, which would mean the loss of 18 acute beds and eight elderly care beds in the facility.

I have been a Member of Parliament for some 18 or 19 months now, but I have not seen an issue that has united people in the way that the campaign to keep open the Margaret Stanhope centre has. At this point, I should like to pay tribute to two gentlemen who are in the audience today, Dr Matt Long and Mr Gerald Chatfield. They have been at the forefront of the SOS—“Save our Stanhope”—campaign, and they have worked diligently and tirelessly to bring the threat of the closure of the Margaret Stanhope to the attention of people in Burton.

I should also mention the invaluable contribution of the Burton Mail, a well respected local newspaper that covers both east Staffordshire and south Derbyshire. It has led the campaign and represented the views of local people extremely well having brought the matter to their attention. I pay particular tribute to the reporter Adrian Jenkins, who has doggedly sought out the facts, and Mr Kevin Booth, who, in his time as editor of the Burton Mail, has turned it into a campaigning newspaper that is properly representative of local people.

The PCT has failed to take account of the grave impact that closing the Margaret Stanhope centre will have on mental health provision across Staffordshire and south Derbyshire. Losing those 18 acute beds and eight elderly beds will leave us with 20 acute beds and 11 elderly beds at the George Bryan centre in Tamworth, and a further 50 acute beds and 26 elderly beds at the St George’s hospital in Stafford, giving a total of 70 acute beds and 37 elderly beds for the whole area covered by the South Staffordshire PCT. I have done some research into this issue, and I have come across an important report that the Audit Commission produced in March last year. That report looked at the provision of mental health in-patient beds at 46 mental health trusts across the country, giving a snapshot of a large number of mental health providers up and down the country. That evidence showed that the median number of beds per 100,000 people was 27.5, yet in south Staffordshire, which has a population of 606,100, we currently have 88 acute beds.

I was rebuked by the Minister earlier for not having very good maths—[Interruption]—the Minister in the previous debate—but I have done the maths and I have had it checked. It shows that the figure for south Staffordshire equates to 14.5 per 100,000. Why should my constituents—people covered by the South Staffordshire PCT in east Staffordshire and across Stafford—be satisfied with the provision of less than half the median number of beds provided to other constituents and residents across the country? My residents think that that is simply not acceptable and they are saying no to that provision.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on bringing this matter to the Chamber. Has any consideration been given in his investigations to the impact on the families of those who would be in those beds, but who suddenly do not have them and will now be at home? What will happen with care in the community for them?

[Andrew Griffiths]

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point, which I hope to come to later in my speech. He has served his community well over many years and he properly understands the needs of families, particularly the most vulnerable in our society.

Removing those beds from the Margaret Stanhope centre will bring the median down to 11.5 per 100,000 people, compared with the median of 27.5 across the country. That is putting lives at risk, and we are not prepared to put up with it in east Staffordshire.

The Audit Commission report also talked about occupancy rates, saying that the median occupancy rate across those 46 trusts was 90%. I requested the occupancy rates from South Staffordshire PCT—I think it took five weeks to winkle, or drag them, out of the PCT. I was provided with the figures for April 2010 to August 2011. I examined them and found that, with the beds at the Margaret Stanhope centre still in place, the occupancy rate across the PCT was 87%.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

This debate gives me such a sense of déjà vu, because a few weeks ago I initiated a debate about how Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust, which has a bed occupancy rate of over 90%, wants to close 35% of its acute beds. Like my hon. Friend, it took me a long time to get the statistics from the trust. When I asked for them to broken down in a different way, the breakdown showed twice as many beds being vacant as the first lot of calculations did. In other words, the trust has not got a clue what its own statistics add up to, yet it is intent on closing beds. Accurate statistics must be central to any consideration, and I think that my hon. Friend and I ought to go and see the Minister about this, if he would be willing to see us.

[Andrew Griffiths]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. He has been vociferous in campaigning on behalf of his local residents—as I am attempting to do—and I share his concerns. None of us is a backwoodsman, and none of us wants to ignore the facts, but the facts that are being presented to us by the PCTs are not the facts. When we dig down and look at the assertions that the PCTs are making, they simply do not add up. I shall give the House further evidence of that later.

For the six months during which we were able to examine the occupancy rate, we found that it was already more than 90%. In June 2010, it exceeded 100%, yet the PCT is telling us that it can safely remove those 18 beds from Margaret Stanhope with no impact on mental health provision in my community. I simply do not accept that.

[Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate and getting the Minister here to listen to it. I also want to praise the campaigning work of Dr Long, Mr Chatfield and the Burton Mail. My constituency of South Derbyshire is a neighbour of east Staffordshire, and we do not have a hospital. My constituents have to travel either to Derby or to Burton, and my southern villages are covered by the South Staffordshire PCT, which is why my hon. Friend and I have come together on this important issue. It is outrageous that one of the excuses that the PCT is putting forward is that people want care in the community. What people want is respite care, and that is why it is so important that the unit should stay open.

[Andrew Griffiths]

My hon. Friend has been brilliant and steadfast in standing alongside me in my attempt to keep open this valuable facility, and I pay tribute to her for that.

Time is moving on, and I want to get to the facts. We extrapolated what the occupancy rates would have been if the Margaret Stanhope centre had been removed. We found that there would have been an average of 113%, and that in June 2010, it would have been 130%, which is a third more than the 100% that I just mentioned. The PCT tries to argue that in-patients can be cared for in their own homes, but I can prove that that is simply not tenable. In an interview in the Burton Mail, the consultant psychiatrist to the PCT, Abid Khan, who is also the clinical director of adult mental health services at the South Staffordshire and Shropshire NHS Foundation Trust said that he had reduced in-patient stays “by a third”. That is a direct quote. He also cited an independent report undertaken by Staffordshire university.

As my hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire (Heather Wheeler) will know, that same report was cited at a passionate public meeting held at the Pirelli stadium in Burton. The report stated that the crisis resolution team could reduce in-patient stays by a third. I asked to see that report. It was also requested by Dr Matt Long, and, after a great deal of fighting, Dr Long managed to get hold of it. We discovered that, far from being independent, it had been produced by Professor Eleanor Bradley, who works not only for Staffordshire university but for the NHS trust. The PCT was claiming that the report was independent, yet it had been produced by someone who was on its payroll. Abid Khan talks about the one third reduction in patient stay, yet when we examine the figures we find that stays over 91 days have been reduced from 39 to 23 days—a reduction, even according to my maths, of about a third—but those between two days and 90 days, which are the vast majority, went down from 524 to 518, a reduction of only six. One-day admittance went up from 48 to 50.

The PCT claims in aid an independent report that is not independent, which states that in-patient stays were reduced by a third, when it is clear that they were not. The PCT expects people to accept the closure of this much-loved facility on the basis of dodgy figures. I put it to the Minister that a PCT cannot be allowed to conduct a consultation in this way, because the consequences are too dangerous to contemplate.

My hon. Friend the Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) has spoken about the impact on families. We all know that families are hugely important in helping people back into mental health well-being and can act as a huge tonic and support. For those who have to go to St. George’s in Stafford, it is a 27-mile trip one way. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire says from a sedentary position that there is no bus from South Derbyshire. That is true. It is 47 minutes by car from Burton. It is an hour on the train, costing £13.50 for a return ticket; then there is a seven-minute bus ride, costing a further £3.50, and a seven-minute walk. A family member wanting to visit a son or daughter, a husband or a wife would face a two and a half hour round trip. It would cost £117 a week or £470 a month. These are some of the most vulnerable people in society, but the PCT thinks it can overcrowd the beds, force people to travel those distances and still provide mental health care that is adequate. I say no—and, more importantly, the people of Burton and South Derbyshire say no.

As a result of the work of Dr Long and of the Burton Mail, 7,500 people have signed a petition to keep the Margaret Stanhope centre open. I have cross-party support for my efforts. East Staffordshire borough council passed a resolution in which every single member united in support for the Margaret Stanhope centre, with Labour councillor standing next to Conservative councillor and the mayor of East Staffordshire, Patricia Ackroyd, manning the battle lines in cold, wet and miserable weather to get people to sign the petition.

I want to make one last point that relates to other services. We all know that people experiencing mental breakdown can often be a danger to themselves or to others. We recognise that the police are at the forefront of dealing with people—it might be a small number—who experience the most acute breakdowns. People often break down in the middle of the night and at the most inconvenient times; they can be a danger to themselves and a danger to their families. Currently, if the police are called to someone at 2 am or 3 am on a Friday or Saturday night, they will try to calm the person as best they can and take them to the Margaret Stanhope centre because they know that the person will get the proper care and support that they need.

I believe that if the Margaret Stanhope centre closes, the police will be faced with two options. Two police officers—they have to travel in pairs—will have to travel all the way to Stafford or Tamworth to drop off a vulnerable person and then come all the way back, which will probably take them out of action for two or three hours. Even worse, however, a vulnerable person might be put in a police cell overnight until the crisis team can come to them. We cannot allow vulnerable people in acute mental breakdown to spend a night in the cell. That is simply not acceptable.

I am hugely grateful, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to bring this debate to Parliament. I know—I had a text earlier from someone saying, “Andrew, will you straighten your tie?”—that people are watching this debate on television in Burton. I know that there is interest in the issue, because I know that the people of Burton and South Derbyshire care passionately about it. The Margaret Stanhope centre has saved lives. It has rebuilt lives. People throughout my constituency owe a debt of gratitude to the magnificent people who work in this institution, and I owe it to them—and the House owes it to them—to ensure proper consideration.

I will leave the House with the words of one of my constituents, who came up to me on one of those mornings when we were collecting signatures in the high street in Burton in the pouring rain. She said that she had had cause to go to the Margaret Stanhope centre, and that when it happened she was married and had two children. She did not know where she was when she arrived at the centre. She did not know whether she would live through the day, and she did not know whether she wanted to live through the day. But she now knows that the care and compassion of the people in the centre, and the love and support of her family who were able to visit her every day, allowed her to rebuild her life, to go back to society and to work, and to go back to being someone of whom her family could be proud.

It is people such as that whom we are here to support today. I hope that the Minister will accept that, and will help us in our campaign to keep the Margaret Stanhope centre open.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Burstow]

I will certainly try to ensure that the data sets that we have are robust, although the future of the Audit Commission is perhaps a moot point in tonight’s debate.

Let me now deal with the local situation outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Burton and, in particular, the proposals relating to the Margaret Stanhope centre. It is important to stress that the proposals are currently the subject of public consultation, notwithstanding some of the concerns about the process that have been outlined.

[Andrew Griffiths]

I thank the Minister for speaking so well about our concerns, but we have little faith in the PCT and the way in which it has conducted itself in this consultation. A rumour is gathering pace in my constituency and locally that the PCT is now going to extend the consultation period past next month’s closing date, for perhaps another three or six months. I and many of my constituents believe that would be a cynical attempt to buy time in order for the furore to die down so that the PCT can plough on regardless of public opinion. Does the Minister agree that as all the facts are now on the record, the PCT must make a decision on the facts as presented and the time scale as already laid out?

[Paul Burstow]

I will certainly give some further consideration to that. I am not sure that I am in a position to give my hon. Friend the undertaking he wants tonight, but if new issues arise it is in the public interest to make sure they are properly understood. My hon. Friend has rehearsed a number of the key issues this evening, and although he is right that consideration is being given to extending the consultation period, that is not for quite as long, as he suggested. I believe the PCT has decided to extend it by three to four weeks. It must do that, as the public and my hon. Friend must have confidence in the process. I am sure that he will understand that in responding tonight what I cannot, will not and must not do is come down on one side or the other on the options being canvassed in the consultation or express a preference as to its outcome. As he will know, there are clear requirements in law in respect of significant service changes that ultimately allow for reference to the Secretary of State, and I must avoid fettering the discretion the Secretary of State might in due course have to exercise.

Staffordshire Local Involvement Network—the LINk—is overseeing this consultation, and it has facilitated sessions after the presentations at public meetings. It has not involved anyone from either the PCT or South Staffordshire and Shropshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust. The LINk will also oversee the analysis of the consultation, to ensure its results are presented objectively. There is an independent element, therefore. I hope that goes some way towards reassuring my hon. Friends who have spoken tonight.

Travel has been mentioned in passing, and it is an important issue. When PCTs and service providers consult on service reconfigurations of this sort they must properly consider travel times, distances and journeys. I am pleased to note that, certainly in terms of the environmental impact assessment, those matters have been brought into play, although I await to see from the outcome of the consultation whether they have been sufficiently brought into play.

The local NHS would say that the consultation is about the future direction of in-patient services in the area and further strengthening community services. We must remember that this consultation is not only relevant to mental health in-patient services in Burton, but that it covers Tamworth and Stafford as well.

Although the concerns raised tonight have rightly focused on the Margaret Stanhope Centre, the important wider issue of improving community mental health services must be kept in mind. That is why I come back to the concern about the impact of reducing the number of beds available in the area. There is a dispute between the NHS locally and my hon. Friend about whether that will retard local services’ ability to meet legitimate needs, or whether more investment in community services will meet those needs.

This has been an important debate because it has allowed my hon. Friend to set out clearly and cogently his concerns. The consultation is not yet concluded and there will now be some additional weeks in which further views can be gathered. Clearly, the campaign being run by the Burton Mail, with the support of many of my hon. Friend’s constituents, will be a factor that the PCT will need to take into account when making its decisions. I am sure that the health overview and scrutiny committee will also want to be satisfied when it draws its conclusions about whether the results of the consultation are safe and sound, and whether it supports a model that does posit the notion that there are many mental health circumstances where the mental health needs are better and more appropriately met in the community, although there is also a need to ensure that there is always a robust in-patient response where that is necessary.

With that, may I take the opportunity to wish you and others in this Chamber the compliments of the season, Mr Speaker? I thank my hon. Friend for raising these matters and I will come back to him on any details that I have not addressed this evening.