Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 25th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

12. What progress has been made in improving access to GPs.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

The Prime Minister’s £50 million challenge fund is improving GP access for more than 3 million patients across England, helping them to get evening and weekend appointments.

[Lorraine Fullbrook]

Many people in South Ribble will be able to see their GPs in the evening and at weekends, thanks to a locally led initiative by Chorley and South Ribble clinical commissioning group and Greater Preston CCG to extend GP surgery opening hours this winter. Does my right hon. Friend agree that such initiatives, which will give greater flexibility to patients and alleviate pressures on other areas of the NHS, particularly A and E, are exactly what is needed in the busy winter months?

[Mr Hunt]

I do agree with my hon. Friend. I took my own children to an A and E department at the weekend precisely because I did not want to wait until later on to take them to see a GP. We have to recognise that society is changing and people do not always know whether the care that they need is urgent or whether it is an emergency, and making GPs available at weekends will relieve a lot of pressure in A and E departments.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 25th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jeremy Hunt]

Let me say this to the hon. Lady: we have very clear rules, and for people who are involved in industry and have a self-interest we have important protections to ensure there is no conflict of interest. Let us be clear: the private sector has an important role to play in the NHS, but it grew far faster under the previous Government than it has done under this one. We are not going to take any lessons about being in hock to the private sector.

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

T3. As the NHS comes through another winter, when it has delivered an outstanding service to more patients than ever before, how does my right hon. Friend assess the damage done by the unfounded scaremongering talk of crisis by the Opposition and some parts of the media?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I encourage those on the Opposition Front Bench in particular to talk to a few people in A and E and ask whether they think they have been supportive, in a very difficult winter, by whipping up all these scare stories when, in fact, because of their hard work, we are seeing 2,000 more people every single day in less than four hours than when the shadow Secretary of State was Health Secretary. A and E is performing better than ever.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Paul Burstow]

First, let me re-emphasise that we know, on the basis of independent assessments that have been carried out, that across England there is a surplus of 50,000 care home places. As regards the provision of care home places and the funding of social care, we have committed to an extra £2 billion going into the system by 2014, half through local government and half directly via the NHS, to ensure that social care services receive support; and just this year, an extra £162 million will go to local authorities to support them in their social care activities.

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

12. What progress he is making in reducing mixed-sex accommodation in the NHS.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Anne Milton)]

Mixed-sex accommodation breaches patients’ privacy and decency. The number of breaches is now coming down, but there are still far too many. That is why, from April, hospitals will be fined £250 for every breach of mixed-sex accommodation. That money will be reinvested back into patient care.

[Lorraine Fullbrook]

I welcome the Government’s move to increase accountability to patients by publishing all occurrences of a patient being placed in mixed-sex accommodation. Does my hon. Friend agree that this move, with the prospect of hospitals being fined £250 per patient placed in mixed-sex accommodation, shows that this Government are tackling a problem that the previous Government claimed was impossible to solve?

[Anne Milton]

We are taking this extremely seriously. I should point out to my hon. Friend that there should be no exceptions to providing high-quality care, which includes high standards of respect for people’s privacy and dignity. We need robust information and the monthly publication of the breach figures, which will tell the public what is going on and allow the NHS to make progress. The previous Government dragged their feet on this issue with a complex system that was neither transparent nor effective.

Contaminated Blood and Blood Products

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robinson]

Unfortunately, the hon. Lady is trying to inject a party position into this debate, which those of us who have been involved in it have tried to exclude from it. We have said that past responses were inadequate and ill-judged—it says that in the motion. I regret that we did not deal with the matter, and I like to think that had I remained at the Treasury, I could have done something. I am open about that too; we all ought to be open here. However, those who say that I, as a former Treasury Minister, should appreciate our legacy are missing the central point: there will never be a good time to do something like this. There will always be bureaucratic arguments, and precedent arguments, and arguments we cannot foresee now but which will one day be made, for why we should do nothing, and the Government have caved into them. That is the reality.

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman agrees that this is a horrendously tragic occurrence. Many haemophiliacs have been affected by this as well, both mentally and physically, and we need to work together and all recognise the dreadful situation that these people find themselves in.

[Mr Robinson]

I am pleased that the hon. Lady has joined the debate and agrees with us. Of course, haemophiliacs have also been affected. The ironic tragedy there is that the treatments given were meant to deal with the basic underlying condition of the haemophilia. I will mention the name of one victim, given that he is a constituent of mine—I am sure that many other Members will mention constituents of theirs too. Given that 4,670 initial cases were affected, and given that there are 650 constituencies, nearly every constituency must have had at least one tragic occurrence. I will therefore mention Joseph Peaty. He is a haemophiliac who went for treatment to correct his underlying condition, but because of the contaminated blood products, he acquired both HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C. He is watching this debate and looking for us to offer victims something more. There is no way we could accept the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

I wish to say a few words about my constituent, Andrew March, who is a victim of contaminated blood. He is not only a remarkable man and campaigner; he is the reason we are talking about this today, because he was the claimant in the judicial review that led to the written ministerial statement. That statement was correctly attacked by my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) today.

I am new to Mr March, in the sense that he has been a constituent of mine since May, as he lives in the Hammersmith and Fulham part of the constituency that I inherited. However, I have caught up quickly with what he has been doing over many years and decades. The easiest way for me to summarise his predicament and what he has done is to read from a letter that he sent to me on 23 July. He said:

“I was one of the young children at the time of the AIDS outbreak, and I had to cope with being told that I had HIV at the age of 9. It was extremely difficult to deal with back then—and the devastation was compounded by the stigma. Before that, I had already been ill from Hepatitis B, again, from blood products because of my haemophilia condition. By 1992, whilst I was studying at the Royal College of Music on a 4-year degree, I was informed that I had also been exposed to hepatitis C, and only 5 years later, I was given another blow when I was informed that I had been exposed to two batches of Factor VIII blood products taken from a donor who later went on to develop vCJD. I had been treated with over 110 bottles of this vCJD-implicated material being injected directly into my bloodstream.”

[Lorraine Fullbrook]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that this very debate helps to raise awareness of those people suffering from hepatitis C contracted from contaminated blood products and helps to remove the stigma attached to hepatitis C? I am thinking of people such as a constituent of mine, who wishes not to be named but is suffering from hepatitis C1a, which is the severest form of hepatitis.

[Mr Slaughter]

I think that this debate does do that, and I am grateful for this opportunity to increase my own knowledge. However, I think that we need to move on to some very specific recommendations because, as the mover of the motion eloquently said, this is a time for action more than contemplation. That is exactly what Mr March did when he brought the judicial review in April, and the matter has been just been clarified, as my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) described, in relation to the mistake that the previous Government made on the situation in Ireland. That was the error made by that Government. That was the finding of the judicial review, and it is what the Government are responding to today.

I shall not read from the judicial review, other than to quote its final paragraphs, because they again relate to Mr March. The learned judge, Mr Justice Holman, said that counsel for the claimant

“paid a warm but measured tribute to…Andrew March, ‘for his tenacity and balance in the asking of questions and soliciting of information, and not taking no for an answer when the reasons are not good ones.’ My impression is that that tribute is justified and well judged, and that the many other people interested in this cause owe gratitude to Mr March for his tenacity or persistence.”

I say again that Mr March has done that for many years, suffering as he did not only from his original medical condition but from the effects of the contamination.

Taintedblood, an organisation that has done a lot of excellent work in briefing us all and preparing us for this debate, states:

“The Under-Secretary of State for Health”—

the hon. Member for Guildford (Anne Milton)—

“recently held a series of meetings with campaigners, the Haemophilia Society, the Macfarlane and Eileen Trusts, the Skipton Fund and others. In those meetings she demonstrated a new willingness by Government to face up to and deal with what has happened to the Haemophilia Community.”

Those organisations must be very disappointed today by the amendment that the Government attempted to move and by the written ministerial statement.

I welcome what is said in the terms of reference about hepatitis C, as has been mentioned. I want to clarify whether the Minister is offering full parity for hepatitis C sufferers with what AIDS sufferers experience, including the £12,800 per annum payments, and that that will be susceptible to the review.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

The hon. Gentleman’s question seems rather churlish, given that he wanted to stop the top-down configuration that NHS London imposed so that people in his area—GPs, the local authority, local people and patients—could have an opportunity themselves to decide how services might best be designed for local people. That is the pledge that I have made. Those criteria will enable that process to be led locally, rather than imposed and forced on people.

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

T4. St Catherine’s hospice is used by many of my constituents, and they will be pleased to be able to go ahead with the hospice’s planned improvements, which will be funded through the capital grants programme. Does the Secretary of State agree, however, that the excellent work of such hospices goes far beyond the hospice building? What will his Department do to ensure that hospices play a greater role in providing services to the local community?

[Mr Lansley]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend, who will know that I entirely understand and applaud the work of St Catherine’s hospice, because we have visited it together. She makes a very important point, because those whom I know in the hospice movement want to think not just about the service that they provide in their buildings, but about an holistic service for patients’ families and for those who require palliative care. I might just say that on Saturday I made it clear that up to £30 million will be available in this financial year to support children’s hospices, specifically, in extending their work so that they can provide a service in the community for children with life-limiting illnesses.