Junior Doctors Contract

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Steve Rotheram

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right to say that. One of the things that is clear to me is that the reason that the May deal is better than the deal that we were going to introduce in February is because of the involvement of the BMA and the BMA leaders in telling us the concerns of junior doctors at the coalface, and the specific niggles and annoyances, many of which we were able to sort out very straightforwardly. I strongly hope that junior doctors will remain in all the discussions that we have, so that we try to get even better solutions.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

At the start of his statement, the Secretary of State used sophistry to try to call into question the result of the ballot, by implying that 58% did not provide legitimacy for the rejection of the Government contract offer. Does he regret using smoke and mirrors, and does he agree that if his flawed methodology were used for other electoral processes, he would not be sitting in this House, there would not be a Tory Government, and we would still be in the EU?

[Mr Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman has misinterpreted what I said. I am clear on this. I said in my statement that 58% voted against the contract, and I accept that that was a majority of BMA members. I stated the fact that on a 68% turnout, around a third of serving junior doctors actively voted against the contract. That is factually correct.

Health and Social Care

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Steve Rotheram

Tuesday 2nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

Yes, I absolutely can. Let me give him one specific example. A couple of years ago, I noted a statistic that showed that 43 people died because they were given the wrong medicine by an NHS doctor or nurse. That problem could be avoided if doctors and nurses had access to people’s medical records so that they could see whether patients had allergies and give them the right medicine. The previous Labour Government had a crack at electronic health records. It was not successful, but they were right to try. We have to get it right if we are to have the best health service in the world. I am committed to that.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State will know that prevention is better than cure. He spoke about parity of esteem for mental health services. I wrote to him last year about a teenager who was threatening to commit suicide. He had been given a counselling appointment through his GP four weeks ahead, even though the kid was saying that he was going to kill himself that day. What will the Secretary of State do about improving counselling services to stop young people wanting to take their life because their appointment is many months away?

[Mr Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman is right to raise that issue. The previous Minister with responsibility for mental health set up the crisis care concordat, which he got all parts of the country to sign up to, to provide better care. There is a big issue with the quality of child and adolescent mental heath services provision. We want to cut waiting times for people in urgent need of an appointment, so I recognise the problem and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will give us some time to bring solutions to the House.