NHS Reform

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Andrew Percy

Thursday 16th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for finding time to come to the Chamber on what I know is an important day. I am not sure whether I am allowed to wish him luck, but I greatly value the time that I spent working with him as a ministerial colleague, and I know he will make an important contribution to the House. He is right, as ever, to speak about mental health. The programme towards seven-day working is as important for mental health as it is for other services, and we must also ensure that the revolution happens for things such as suicide rates and crisis care. He is right about the importance of the social care system; and in my mind when I speak about seven-day care I am thinking about social care and health as one entity.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

Our doctors no doubt work incredibly hard in our hospitals. The people of Brigg and Goole and the Isle of Axholme work at weekends, whether in factories, at the docks or in the fields, and they want an NHS that does the same. The Secretary of State will know about my passion for ambulance services, which at weekends are often the last line of support for patients. What will his plans mean for ambulance services and the incredible job that paramedics do across the country?

[Mr Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend because he leads by example as a first responder and does a fantastic job in his constituency—indeed, that role takes place at weekends. Paramedics and ambulance services operate a seven-day service. Nurses, paramedics and others who work in hospitals currently do not have an opt-out; consultants are the only ones who do. These measures will give ambulance services confidence that if they take someone to hospital at the weekend, there will be a proper senior consultant present and their patient will get in front of the right person. That will make their job all the more rewarding.

Health and Social Care

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Andrew Percy

Tuesday 2nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I am afraid that this is exactly the sort of distortion and scaremongering that got the right hon. Gentleman nowhere in the election campaign. He knows perfectly well that the 2012 Act does nothing different from what the EU procurement rules required under the primary care trusts when he was Health Secretary. Yes, I do believe that there is a role for the independent sector in the NHS, but I think the decision whether things should be done by the traditional NHS or the independent sector should be decided locally by GPs doing the right thing for their patients. That is the difference between us.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

The Secretary of State is spot on with regard to the use of language. In the last Parliament the Health Select Committee saw an attempt to paint a picture of privatisation as equalling the provision of private health care. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that under the previous Government private sector activity in foundation trusts fell and the rate of privatisation was slower than in the preceding five years—something that the Committee noted in a report that was blocked by Labour members of the Committee?

[Mr Hunt]

Yes, I will. The figures that my hon. Friend cites are right. I will tell him something else. Half a million fewer people took out private health insurance in the previous Parliament because the quality of care that they could get on the NHS was rising. The Government are committed to the NHS. If the right hon. Member for Leigh does not want to believe what I am saying about privatisation, perhaps he will believe the respected think-tank the King’s Fund, which is clear that his claims of mass privatisation were and are exaggerated.