4 Lord Bach debates involving the Department of Health and Social Care

Covid-19 Update

Lord Bach Excerpts
Wednesday 1st July 2020

(4 years, 4 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord Bethell Portrait Lord Bethell
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The right reverend Prelate is right that bringing together data from a very large number of sources is a challenge. One could include social media data, digital tracking data, hospital data and 111 data. We are working on systems that bring all the possible data one could imagine to one place at the joint biosecurity centre. We have made huge strides on that, but there is work to be done, and we are very much focused on it.

Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach (Lab) [V]
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My Lords, I declare my interest as the elected police and crime commissioner for Leicestershire and Rutland. I want to make it clear that I agree with the decision the Government have taken. The data makes it clear that it is necessary at the present time. This is primarily a health matter, but the excellent Leicestershire Police will be expected to play its part. It will do so proportionately and reasonably in the British tradition of policing by consent. The police may well incur extra costs in policing this matter. Will the Minister today make a promise that any extra costs the force incurs will be met fully by the Government?

Lord Bethell Portrait Lord Bethell
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My Lords, it is beyond my brief to comment on Home Office funding for the police force, but I emphasise that funding has been put in place— £300 million—for local authorities specifically to cover outbreak management and further funds are being looked at to cover this area.

NHS: ECMO Machines

Lord Bach Excerpts
Monday 22nd April 2013

(11 years, 6 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, my advice is that in most cases of cardiac arrest that is not possible. Where there has been circulatory arrest in the particular conditions that I described, such as immersion in very cold water, the heart can in some circumstances be restarted, but I would not wish to excite noble Lords’ interest in this technique without proper evidence. I am afraid that the article, which I did see, raises people’s hopes perhaps unfairly.

Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach
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My Lords, can we take it from the answer that the Minister gave two questions ago and the praise that he rightly gave to Glenfield Hospital in Leicester that that ECMO unit will not be closed down?

Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, as the noble Lord knows, that decision is interdependent with the decision around the Safe and Sustainable review of children’s cardiac services. Until that issue is determined, it is not possible for me to say what will happen to the children’s ECMO service at Glenfield.

NHS: Children’s Congenital Heart Services

Lord Bach Excerpts
Thursday 25th October 2012

(12 years ago)

Lords Chamber
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Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, I accept that there are interdependencies between the provision of children’s cardiac surgery and the children’s ECMO service. If new evidence emerges or there are exceptional circumstances, such as a change in circumstances following either the Independent Reconfiguration Panel review or any judicial review that may occur, then my right honourable friend the Secretary of State may wish at a future time to review the earlier decision.

Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach
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Is the Minister aware of how absurd it would be to have an independent report on the future of the heart unit but to exclude any consideration of the fate of the ECMO unit? As the right reverend Prelate said a few minutes ago, they are inextricably linked; indeed, the Minister seems to have conceded that there is a link between them. I remind him that Members of another place from all parties and from different parts of the country made it clear in their excellent debate earlier this week that the two are linked. As the Minister’s right honourable and learned friend Sir Edward Garnier said:

“We all know that the current decision is wrong and needs to be dealt with”.—[Official Report, 22/10/12; col. 188WH.]

Will the Government please look at this again before the whole country—

None Portrait Noble Lords
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Question!

Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach
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I think this is a question. Will the Minister please look again at this before the whole country loses an outstanding part of our National Health Service?

Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, I hope that my initial Answer will have made it clear that we expect the Independent Reconfiguration Panel to look at the issue in the round, and that includes the consequences of the JCPCT’s decision, were that to be carried through. I hope that that is sufficiently reassuring. However, what the panel cannot do, in law, is review the decision of the Secretary of State. It can, however, take all the circumstances into account, and I believe that it should do so.

NHS: Primary Care Trusts

Lord Bach Excerpts
Tuesday 17th July 2012

(12 years, 3 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach
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My Lords—

Lord Strathclyde Portrait The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
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My Lords, perhaps we could hear from the noble Lord, Lord Soulsby.

Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord. The Co-operation and Competition Panel undertook a review of restrictions on patient care last year, and although it uncovered quite a number of examples of arbitrary rationing, those were cases that took place under the previous Government. We have banned all such cases. We do not believe that this kind of arbitrary restriction is at all widespread, and we have yet to receive any firm evidence that it is taking place at all.

Lord Bach Portrait Lord Bach
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My Lords, I wonder if the Minister is aware of the widespread feeling of disgust and disappointment at the Government’s decision to close the ECMO cancer unit for children at the world-renowned Glenfield Hospital in Leicester. Is he aware that the quality of work done at that hospital has been praised internationally, and that many thousands of people in Leicester, Leicestershire and beyond are just appalled at the Government’s insensitive and brutal decision?

Earl Howe Portrait Earl Howe
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My Lords, I am aware of the concern that the noble Lord has reflected in his remarks, but I think that it would be wrong of me to comment. That particular decision flowed directly from a review which was conducted by the NHS, quite consciously at arm’s length from Ministers. The matter is currently under scrutiny and I would not wish to pre-empt any decision that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State wishes to take.